


3.2.218

by prittyspeshul



Category: Professional Wrestling, World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: I don't really know what this is, Kid Fic, M/M, Past Child Neglect, all that i know is that daddy dean will be the death of me, best boss carmella, have ALL the cameos, minor medical inaccuracies, poor maternal relationships are a theme here, roman continues to kind of be a little shit, roman is a little shit, so are daddy issues, technical inaccuracies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-09
Updated: 2016-06-13
Packaged: 2018-04-19 21:41:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 33,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4761983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prittyspeshul/pseuds/prittyspeshul
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leave it to Dean to fall in love with the only bisexual man in a city-wide radius who has a pre-started family.</p><p>[a series of one-shots following the growth of a family, in loose chronological order]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The gentleman doth

Dean Ambrose insisted, from a very early age, that he would not, under any circumstances, be having children.

“The world is overpopulated as is,” he would tell anyone who would listen, “The foster care system is overrun and rife with abuse, and even kids that have parents around end up fucked up.”

Roman would just roll his eyes and tell him they were running late and he had to pick up Joelle from preschool.

Occasionally, while Dean sat on his floor and patiently bore the zealous attentions of the four year old, Roman would try to reason with him, pointing out that he was the only babysitter that she didn’t complain about, or that he was the only person besides Roman himself that he trusted to take care of her in an emergency (which is why he was on speed-dial), or that he was sitting there and letting her paint his nails neon pink, for heavens’ sake. Dean would just shrug and say, “Jojo’s different. I can give her back.”

Roman resisted the urge to smack him upside the head in front of his daughter.

 

 

The universe had taken all of Dean’s grand speeches as a sort of “the lady doth protest too much,” however, so it decided to dump Seth Rollins in his life.

Seth was about a year younger and an inch shorter than Dean, a new bartender at Dean and Roman’s favorite place, and quite possibly the man of his dreams. He gave him a once-over, decided “yes, this is love at first sight,” and proceeded to flirt badly with him for quite a while until Roman intervened.

Then the subject of children was brought up when Roman had to take a goodnight call from Joelle (she was visiting her grandparents in Florida and simply insisted that her daddy still read her a bedtime story every night; Dean told him she came by the stubborn streak honestly). Dean went on his usual rant, finishing with a slap of the bar for emphasis, and felt very proud of himself until he saw the tight smile on the bartender’s face.

Seth unfolded a wallet and laid a small photo of quite possibly the most adorable little girl he had ever seen on the bar (right where Dean had slapped, actually, and the symbolism was not lost on him).

“Her name is Aveline.”

Roman came back in high spirits to find Dean trying to drown himself in his beer and Seth’s hands shaking as he poured shots.

 

 

Dean went back and forth, up and down, left and right in his mind, trying to find a way out of the hole he had dug for himself, because he couldn’t get the bartender off his mind long enough even to get on someone else, and every time he went back to the bar Seth found an excuse to wait tables or to serve another section exclusively. Finally, after six weeks of this nonsense, Dean marched into the establishment, planted himself on a stool, and declared that he would not be moving until Seth talked to him.

 The first glass that was set down in front of him broke from the force.

The second was half-full from the shaking.

Dean caught the trembling hand and laced his fingers through it, meeting brown eyes and asking the question that had been bothering him for a month and a half. “How old is she?”

He’d never seen a smile so wide before.

 

 

Their courtship was an elaborate dance of one step forward and two steps back, because both men were guarded and cautious from years of practice, until finally they decided “fuck it” and dove in headfirst. Which is how Dean ended up outside Seth’s small apartment, holding a gift-wrapped package of Duplo a very nice saleswoman at Target had helped him pick out, hoping desperately he didn’t smell too much like the cigarette he’d had to calm his nerves and that he wasn’t going to fuck this up entirely.

Seth opened the door, balancing a small fluffy thing Dean assumed was a dog in one arm and the tiniest, angriest four year old he had ever seen in the other. She had a wild nest of brown curls, bright, sky-blue eyes, mismatched Star Wars and Disney Princess socks, and her shirt on backward. Her expression was nothing less than concentrated homicidal rage.

Dean stepped inside at Seth’s gesture and closed the door behind him. Seth released the fluffy thing, and it flew at his boots, barking for all of ten seconds before it smelled the spot where Dean’s cat had peed on them and ran away whining. The whole exchange was missed on both adults, who were carefully gauging the reaction of the nuclear warhead on Seth’s hip.

“Aveline, sweetheart,” he began, slowly, brushing a stray wave out of her face, “This is Dean, Daddy’s boyfriend.”

She considered Dean for a moment before opening her mouth, sticking out her tongue, and blowing a big, fat raspberry right in his face.

Dean had seen Seth handle angry and even violent drunks without breaking a sweat, but the best way to describe the expression on his face at this exact moment would have been “utterly and completely gobsmacked.” For his part, Dean was using literally all his self-control to maintain his feet, because he was laughing so hard he was pretty sure he was going to piss himself.

Aveline looked between the two of them and her rage melted into raucous giggles.

It was love at first sight (again).


	2. Traditions and superstitions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is dedicated to ChristineRedfield for the comment. Enjoy the fluff.

“Dean, she’s four; I think it’s a little late to be doing this.”

“Well, I wasn’t around when she was the right age, now was I,” came the sharp retort, “but I can certainly rectify your egregious oversight now.” He made the final adjustments of the objects on the coffee table before straightening and resting his hands on his hips, giving his dark-haired lover the _Enough of Your Sass_ (copyright pending) glare that usually only managed to make the other man giggle. Seth stifled his laughter and wrapped an arm around the taller man’s waist, drawing him in for a lingering kiss. It still amazed him how easily things had fallen into place; they had only been together for a little over three months, but the blond had slipped into every crevice of his and his daughter’s daily routine so easily it felt like much, much longer.

Dean had wrapped his arm around his waist in return, fingers resting against the hipbone exposed by his mesh shorts. He had gotten back from his midafternoon (thank god for naptime) run to a very demanding question from a very concerned partner: “You’re part Polish, right?” After Seth’s confused nod, Dean had pushed him in the shoulder (with some force) and demanded, “Have you done the test with Aveline yet?” When his question had met only a blank look, the other man had looked positively aghast and began bustling around the house grabbing seemingly random objects. Seth had decided to stay out of his way, ducking into the bathroom to take the world’s fastest shower before checking on his little girl, who was playing dress-up in her bedroom with a remarkably pliant cat. Initially, Seth had been concerned about the wiry, scruffy grey thing missing half an ear (“What if he scratches her? What if she’s too rough and he bites her and she gets cat scratch fever and dies?”), but when he watched the cat (relatively) willingly submit to wearing a doll sweater within two hours of them meeting, he figured they would be just fine.

He had played with the two for a few minutes before there was a loud crash from the kitchen, and Aveline laughed at her father’s cringing expression.

“Dean broke the shelf again,” she said solemnly, and he nodded, trying to keep the surprise out of his expression. He was going to have a talk with someone about the “again” part of her sentence, but for now he decided simply to figure out what the actual hell his boyfriend was up to. He found him scrabbling among some broken dishware and muttering something about a shot glass in the middle of the kitchen and finally got up the courage to ask, ever so politely, “Dean, baby, what the fuck are you doing?”

 “Gotta do the birthday test,” he answered, surrounded by the broken plates and staring up at Seth as if it were the simplest thing in the world.

“… the what?”

“The birthday test! You know, where you put out the book and the wine glass and the coins—”

Seth thought for a moment, then vaguely recalled hearing stories and seeing something involving baby cousins grabbing objects out of an assortment on their birthdays. “Are you talking about the superstition thing?”

“Yes! It’s very important, Seth. I can’t believe you didn’t do it!” There was such a tone of accusation in his voice that the dark-haired man’s hackles rose, but there was something else in his eyes—a little bit of excitement, and more than a little bit of sadness—that made him bite his tongue. Dean was painfully reticent about his childhood, but the little he had divulged did not paint a remotely pleasant picture, and sometimes Seth would catch him looking at the way he interacted with Aveline with an inscrutable expression, especially when they were doing something like reading a bedtime story or playing at the park; the first time he had seen Dean demonstrate any kind of crack in his tough guy façade was when the little girl had approached him, brush in hand and tears welling in her eyes, and asked him to “please brush my hair, cuz I can’t get through all the tangles please?” Seth had to bite back tears of his own at the painfully tender way the other man had combed her admittedly unmanageable hair, even braiding it for her. They had never talked about it, but after that Dean had taken over bedtime hair-brushing duties. In summary, he recognized that this was Important to Dean, even if he personally thought it was ridiculous and old-fashioned.

Still, he couldn’t resist, pointing out, “Dean, she’s four; I think it’s a little late to be doing this.”

And that was how they came to be wrapped up together, surveying the spread of objects on the coffee table: a book (the intellectually stimulating _Llama Llama, Mad at Mama_ that Aveline was so fond of), a pin that bore a picture of Buddy Jesus (he wanted to be surprised, but he really wasn’t), a shot glass with a very inappropriate word on it (that was his), a cigarette (Dean had been really, really trying to quit, but they’d had a Very Big Fight a few days ago when Seth had discovered Kevin chewing on a pack of them), and a crumpled-up dollar bill. It wasn’t exactly the array he was familiar with, and it was by no means traditional, but he supposed two men raising a little girl wasn’t exactly traditional either, and the two men so doing it definitely weren’t, so it struck him as weirdly appropriate.

“So… the book is for intelligence, the pin is for religion, the shot glass speaks for itself, but isn’t the cigarette just repeating the shot glass?” He reached to adjust the former and received a smack on the hand.

Dean’s tone was long-suffering as he answered. “No, dearest, the shot glass is for alcoholism, and the cigarette means that she will be a tramp.”

“Are people still tramps in 2015?”

“You certainly are,” and the taller man ducked away from a playful swing and disappeared down the hallway, grinning the stupid quirked grin that made Seth’s heart melt a little more than it should, especially after three months. The magic should be wearing off by now, right? But then Dean reappeared from the hallway, bearing his tiny dark-haired princess, kissing her on the cheek, and he was pretty sure the magic would never disappear.

“Okay, little one,” he began, depositing her behind the coffee table, and stationing himself in a crouch on the opposite side, “so this is something your daddy was supposed to do a long time ago, but he’s no fun, so I’m gonna do it now.” Aveline giggled, and said “no-fun daddy” stuck his tongue out at the man across the room. “You just gotta pick one of the things here. It doesn’t matter which one, just whichever one you want.” He spread his arms, indicating the table, and for a heartbeat Seth waited for the ever-ready tiny “why,” but it didn’t come. For some reason, Dean was immune to her questions, while he himself was inundated with questions for every move he ever made. But he wasn’t bitter, of course not.

The little cloud of hair looked at all of the things, chubby fingers near her mouth, and Seth could practically feel the intensity of her decision making process from his perch next to the kitchen. His bet was on the book; she couldn’t get enough of story time, some nights begging for “one more chapper, please, Daddy?” She began to circle the table, fingers still near her mouth, and she was approaching the book. A flush of warm pride started in his belly—she came by her love of reading honestly—but then she reached for something that made him gasp outright.

She squeezed between the edge of the table and Dean’s knees, crawling between his legs, and poked him in the chest before wrapping her arms around his middle. “I choose Dean,” she announced, entirely innocent, snuggling her face into his t-shirt.

It took Seth a minute to understand why his vision was blurring, but then he was crying silently, big fat tears with his hand pressed to his mouth, and he watched Dean enfold the little girl in his arms, pressing his chin to the top of her head. His eyes were closed, and brown eyes traced the path of a single drop as it disappeared into brown curls. Aveline made a noise and pulled back, touching the stubbly face with a worried expression, turning from one man to the other. Her face fell, and she asked, quietly, “Did I do it wrong?”

“No, princess,” Seth managed, surprised at the stability of his voice, at the same moment Dean squeezed her and whispered, “No, you chose just right.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Daddy Dean wasn't finished with me. This is turning a lot more fluffy and a lot less funny than I wanted, but hey, whatever, right?


	3. Rainclouds and bronze linings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is dedicated to Britt_B, Syreina, and ChristineRedfield for their comments. I appreciate the feedback so much, guys. I hope you like this new installment.
> 
> Also, my goodness, over 50 kudos almost overnight. I'm overwhelmed, guys. Thank you to every single person who read this.

Seth was not in a good mood.

Actually, describing his current glowering state as a "bad mood" was an understatement. He had zoomed past "bad mood" six miles ago on the freeway when someone had abruptly changed lanes and nearly smashed him and his motorcycle (the borrowed-from-Dean motorcycle, the threatened-with-unspeakable-horrors-if-it-was-returned-in-anything-less-than-pristine-condition motorcycle, the adored-more-than-any-real-limits-of-sanity motorcycle, _that_ motorcycle) into the median, and that was _after_ he had been informed by no less than three different college officials that he made too much money to qualify for any sort of financial assistance. Now, sitting in the driveway, reflecting on his day thus far, he could actually see the sign that read "bad mood" as a tiny smudge in his peripheral vision. He was no longer in just in a dark cloud; he was the dark cloud, despoiling all of the earth beneath his gloomy reign. He had reached full Debbie Downer mode.

And it had started out as such a promising morning, too. It was one of his rare full days off, and he had decided that he would brave the trek to the local city college campus to find out some more details about registration and financial aid. As much fun as he had tending bar and as great as the flexible hours had been while Aveline had been small, it was becoming ever-clearer to him that the schedule wasn't something he could keep up forever, especially once she began kindergarten next fall (he'd had to push down a wave of bile at that realization, too, because his baby was growing up and that was not something he had the emotional reserves even to consider beginning to process). He'd really only been able to do it for so long as it was because of his fabulous neighbor; Nat didn't have any children of her own, and she was more than willing to watch her a few days a week when his utterly sleep-deprived brain threatened mutiny unless it got some shut-eye.

With Dean entering the picture, he finally had a little bit of wiggle room where both money and time were concerned (the blond _insisted_ on spending the days and evenings Seth worked with Aveline, and she looked forward to it, mostly because Dean absolutely spoiled her flighty childish whims; she’d told Seth that one day she couldn’t pick between two movies at the theater, so he bought tickets to both and they watched them one after the other), and he had the chance to consider higher education. He would never regret the choice to keep his daughter, nor would he regret the decision to pursue full custody of her after things with her mother devolved, but college wasn’t exactly something he had been able to think about while raising a baby on his own.

So he’d headed over to the nearest city college, hopeful for the first time in a very long time, only to have his dreams dashed pretty instantly. Not only was the day dark and stormy and the roads treacherously damp, not only was the campus filled with younger prospective students (he’d overheard a few of them discussing their upcoming high school graduations and nearly thrown himself into a bush), which conjured up off-putting images of himself crammed into a class with what may as well have been children, but he was also informed that due to his income, he would most definitely not qualify for any of the grants he had so meticulously researched. Seth had left the financial aid office thoroughly disheartened, and he had been tempted to shake with some violence more than one of the shining young faces he encountered on his way to the parking lot.

Reliving the pity-filled words of the woman at the college only filled him with a swell of helpless, directionless rage. He scrubbed at his sweaty face with one hand, biting it back as he headed toward the house. College wasn’t going to be a possibility; he could always switch to waiting tables. Yeah. That was exactly what he wanted to do. He stepped inside and began to peel off the heavy boots he’d borrowed from his boyfriend, not bothering even to call out a greeting. He needed a few moments to clear the funk from his brain before he saw anyone; Aveline was unusually sensitive to Daddy’s mood swings, and she’d pick up right away that he was unhappy and become unhappy herself. Their moods fed off each other, and the last thing he needed today was a destructively spiraling toddler.

He pressed his face into the doorjamb, willing the artificial coolness of the indoors to stifle his roiling frustration. After a moment, the grey cat slinked into view, meowed plaintively at him, and coiled around his ankles.

“Hey, kitty,” he murmured, sinking into a crouch to pet the purring feline. Generally, he wasn’t too fond of cats, but Seth had decided to make an exception for this one, especially since Aveline liked him so much. His owner was pretty alright too. “Normally you don’t like me much unless you haven’t been fed. Come on, Carwash.”

The fuzzy throw-rug obediently padded after him as he moved to the kitchen. It wasn’t the stupidest name he’d ever heard for an animal, and when Dean had explained he’d found the kitten hiding under his wheel-well after going to his namesake, it made a lot more sense. As he approached the dining area, he was surprised to hear soft giggling; normally, at this time of day, Dean and Aveline took a walk down to the playground (another way Dean was superior to Daddy; Seth only took her there on weekends, but “Dean takes me every day!”) but of course, it had been raining earlier. He veered off-course a bit to peek his head through the second doorway, and the sight that greeted him made all thoughts of his terrible day vanish in a puff of sparkling pixie dust.

Both Dean and Aveline were sitting at the kitchen table, two enormous piles of what looked like goldfish crackers between them. Instead of eating the crackers, Aveline was carefully and precisely shaping them into something on the cleared table--after a moment, she stopped, pondered her creation, and looked to Dean. He grinned and nodded, and she popped one of the fish from the far pile into her mouth. She brushed her hair out of her eyes with a full hand, spreading a little bit of orange dust into her bangs, before falling back upon the table with a keen eye, tracing the various shapes of the crackers and shaping the letters with her mouth.

"It’s almost finished," she said, suddenly, casting adoring eyes on the man carelessly popping crackers into his mouth. The blond next to her leaned over and studied the splay of orange on the table, finally tapping a mostly empty space next to her elbow.

“You should make a flower right there,” he rasped, and his voice still sent shivers through Seth. The cat had twined around his feet in the doorway but remained oddly silent, as though he understood it was important to remain unnoticed. Aveline took up a handful of crackers with practiced concentration and dumped them into the space, working for a moment or two before her tiny eyebrows knit in frustration and she announced, “I don’t know how to make the petals.”

Dean leaned over, carefully wrapping one arm around her, and the little way she moved closer to his arm just about made Seth’s heart burst. He watched her concentration on the way the man’s fingers were moving the crackers on the table, and she eventually took over, muttering something about “and longways for the stem” before leaning back to admire her handiwork. Dean’s arm was still around her, and his face curled into a mischievous grin before he leaned over and blew a raspberry on her distracted cheek. She squealed and giggled, pushing at his face and trying to escape at the same time that his arm drew her closer. At that moment, the sun finally poked its head out for the first time all day and lit up the tiny window behind them, casting both of the figures into relief; a silhouette of adoration and play, with little beams of light peeking through their hair like bronze halos.

If his mood hadn’t already been banished by the adorable scene, it certainly would have been now. His chest was full of so much warmth he didn’t really know what to do, so he settled for clearing his throat and finally announcing himself. Dean jumped a bit, squinting in the glare, before his face lit up, and the girl jumped out of her chair to wrap around his legs, with a happy cry of “Daddy!”

The dark-haired man swept her up and pressed a giant kiss to her forehead, which she protested with more giggles (god how Seth loved her tiny laugh) and complaints that his beard was scratchy. “We didn’t go to the park today because it was too wet, so we stayed home and Dean teached me how to make letters out of crackers!”

The teacher looked a little embarrassed, sheepishly rubbing a hand to his light wispy hair, and indicated the table. “We got a little carried away, I think.”

Seth surveyed the mosaic of orange fish on the table with a cocked eyebrow. Almost the entire surface was covered, sometimes with blobby shapes, but mostly with letters: there were scattered a’s, s’s, and d’s, but most impressively, nearest to where the little one had been seated, the names “Aveline,” “Dean,” and “Seth” were spelled out. The flower she had been making was next to his name, and she made a little noise of distress when she realized that in her excitement to greet him, she had pushed some of the petals out of order.

“I made that flower for you, but I messed it up,” she complained, sticking her lower lip out in a miniature pout (it wasn’t yet at its most dangerous form, but Seth had seen enough of that pout to understand that he would be fully under its spell in a short time). He pressed another scratchy kiss to her forehead and put her down, kneeling between the two chairs.

“Why don’t you show me how you made it the first time?” he asked, and her eyes lit up and she eagerly began explaining the intricacies of shaping the crackers. Seth’s attention shifted to the other man, and he laced their fingers together, squeezing for a heartbeat when Dean’s brow knit. The cloud of his bad mood still clung around him, but it was less important here, between the two people he loved. This was where he belonged, and he would have made the exact same choices ten thousand times just for this single moment.

Let those college kids have the grants. He had this.


	4. Lessons in grief

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is dedicated to Brutus the French bulldog and his daddy, Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson. To quote someone who said it better than I can, "May you run in paradise little Brutus over the rainbow bridge. And may your Daddy find some comfort knowing your story will save many people the heartbreak he is feeling right now."
> 
> Obviously, this chapter comes with a warning about **animal death**. It's described, not in any kind of specific detail, but it's present.

Dean knew there was something wrong the minute he walked into the apartment and was greeted by utter and complete silence. Usually, silence in this apartment meant one of two things: Aveline was asleep, or no one was home. Since he had passed by Seth's vehicle in the driveway and nearly tripped over a pair of tiny lime green sandals in the doorway, he could safely scratch the latter off the list, and after a quick peek down the hallway where all the doors stood open, he ascertained the former was also not the case. 

"Seth?" he called, keeping his volume low, shuffling stockinged feet along the hardwood floor. He dug his phone out of his pocket, finding with alarm that there were 2 missed calls (thirty minutes apart) and a text, all from his boyfriend--this was shaping up to be a Very Bad Event. The light-haired man scratched ruefully at the stubble on his jaw, chest seized with a peculiar kind of panic as he redialed and held the phone up to his ear, not bothering with the text. What if something had happened to Seth? To Aveline? He slumped slightly, luckily pinning his shoulder against the wall, grinding his teeth while he waited the eternal seconds between rings. Idly, he noticed that while Carwash was sunning himself in the windowsill over the kitchen sink, the other ball of fluff that occupied the apartment hadn't yet come to greet him. The call went to voicemail, and to distract himself he wandered vaguely through the four rooms, clicking his tongue to summon the dog. 

Maybe they had just gone out for a walk. Sure. And called him twice and sent a text that yelled "URGENT PLZ CALL" in all caps. 

Dean was really beginning to worry now. He paced uncertainly between the living room and the front door, torn between wanting to go find his missing charges (he was counting the dog too) and reasoning that staying in was the best course of action because they could come home while he was out wandering around like an idiot and he really didn't have any leads as to where they were right now. He realized his breath was coming in short, sharp gasps, and he forced himself to take a deep breath and stay still until the world stopped spinning around him. Out of habit, he reached for and fingered the scar on his chest, the familiar motion soothing him enough to maintain a normal breathing pattern but not enough to stop his mind from wandering and imagining horrific scenarios. 

What if Aveline had gotten hit by a car, or Seth had while saving her? What if Aveline had an allergic reaction to nuts at preschool because some other child had brought in a peanut butter sandwich and shared it with her? What if they were trapped in a burning building? What if--

The door swung open, and he practically leaped for it; he took approximately two seconds to recognize that it was, in fact, the renter of the apartment before grabbing Seth and dragging him into a bearhug that was almost crushing. 

"Where were you, I was so fucking worried when you didn't answer, and your car is still here--"

Seth had slumped against him, forehead and cheek awkwardly crammed into his neck, and Dean realized Nat (the neighbor who babysat when he wasn't around and who had a pretty damn good cheesecake recipe) was standing behind them in the doorway, cradling a sleeping ball with a fluff of dark curls. She'd stirred at Dean's voice and rolled over, eyes wide and red, and promptly broke into enormous sobs, struggled to get down, running into her bedroom and slamming the door with a surprising amount of force for stubby four year old arms. His boyfriend had stiffened against him when Aveline had begun to wail, and he cringed when the door slammed. Dean glanced at Nat out of the corner of his eye, and she shook her head silently and indicated Seth before quietly pulling the door closed. At the click of the wood, the dark-haired man wrapped his arms around the taller man's neck and murmured something incoherent.

"Babe," Dean began, cautiously, threading his arms more carefully around the slim waist, "what happened? What's going on?"

There was a slight shudder that ran the length of the body pressed into his, and that was when Dean felt the plastic animal carrier thump against his knee.

It didn't take him long to figure out that it was empty.

 

* * *

 

 

Seth sat on the couch, face dried and eyes swollen, tucked impossibly tightly into the corner seat and clutching a thin cloth strap with a bell on it. Mindlessly, he clasped and unclasped the plastic latch of the collar, thinking back to the day he had picked Kevin out of the litter, eight years ago, before he had even met Aveline's mother. The dog had been through everything with him, offering quivering furry comfort from the nastiest fight he'd had about the pregnancy to lapping up all the attention he received in the recent warmth of a too-full home. He knew he should go soothe his daughter (her wails had long ago sunk into hiccups and finally into fitful sleep-sobs), but he needed a moment to collect himself and figure out the emotions that were throwing a party in his brain before he could even think about tending to hers.

He knew most people would think he was a fool, sitting here blubbering about a six pound dog, but Kevin had been more than that. He had been Seth's only friend for the first long year of tending to a preemie baby pretty much single-handedly, the only creature that had been glad to see him no matter how short a time he had been gone, the only creature that cared about his existence for the few terrible months he had spiraled into the darkness when Aveline had been gone. And now, he was gone. He may have been a very small dog, but he left a hole that felt at least ten times his size.

A steaming mug was nudged against his hand, and he took it, wrapping the collar around the handle and lifting his gaze to worried blue eyes. The concern was so evident and palpable it made his chest warm despite himself, and he caught the hand that had offered the mug with his free one.

"Thank you, Dean," he offered, pulling himself out of the corner where he was wedged to rest his head against the standing man's hip.

A ripple traveled down the fabric of the t-shirt the other man wore as he knelt to press lips to his knuckles and then his hair, followed by an uncertain, "What happened?"

"He got into a pack of gum." Dean's eyes were wide and confused, and he forestalled the forthcoming objection with what the vet had told him. "There's a sweetener in sugar-free gum that's very toxic to dogs. One or two pieces is enough to make a big dog sick; Kevin ate the entire pack. There was nothing we could do for him. His liver shut down." 

Momentarily, he felt gratified as blue eyes misted with shock and horror, and a heavy weight descended on the cushion next to him. "That's awful..."

"He was Aveline's first pet," Seth began tonelessly, fingers stroking the fabric wrapped around the mug handle. He sipped the scalding beverage without tasting, burning his tongue, but it was something to focus on besides the dull ache in his chest. "He followed her around like a little nanny when she started to crawl. He saved her from going down the stairs more than once in our old place." There was a sharp tugging sensation in his belly and he realized he was in tears again; that realization was immediately followed by the realization that he couldn't give two shits anymore. It was Dean. And Kevin had been his friend, damn it. "It was so funny when she finally discovered that she was bigger than he was; she refused to put him down for a week, I swear."

Dean leaned over and drew Seth closer, rubbing circles on his shoulder blade and pressing his cheek to the other's temple. "Loss of any kind is hard to deal with the first time. And afterwards it's still tough, you just know how to cope a little better."

Seth squeezed their linked hands, nodding. "Yeah... she knows a little about that."

Dean closed his eyes and kissed his hairline. They hadn't really talked about Aveline's mother, but Dean was astute enough to realize she was not in the picture and had not been for quite some time. He let a silence settle between them, until finally Seth ventured, "I wish I knew where the gum came from, though. Neither of us chew it."

A miniscule voice piped up miserably from behind the couch, "It was mine."

Both men jumped, turning to find the child curled up on the floor, practically under the skirt of the ancient sofa.

"What do you mean, sweetheart?"

Cloudy blue eyes flickered to their faces for a second, falling back to where she had been looking, before she repeated, "It was my gum. Mrs. Nat gived me a pack cause I helped her clean her tub and I said I never get to chew it here."

Dean and Seth shared a significant nod, and the taller man used his longer arms to collect the little girl from the floor and deposit her between the adults on the couch. She didn't resist; in fact, she didn't actively react at all, simply readjusting her body into the tight curl she had been in on the floor. Like father like daughter, he supposed, looking at the tight lines of both babyish and adult faces. 

The presence of his despondent princess had drawn Seth out of his funk. He pulled her head onto his lap, draping his free arm around her back and resting a hand comfortably on her hip and against Dean's stomach. "Sweetheart, you know this isn't your fault, right?" 

Positively venomous blue eyes snapped at him before her tiny voice managed to. "Yeah it is! If I hadn't dropped my gum Kevin wouldn't have getted it!"

"Oh, baby, baby, baby," he murmured, forcing back the hoarseness of his throat, "it was an accident. You didn't know gum was bad for puppies, right? And you didn't drop it on purpose."

"No, I din't," she whimpered, closing her eyes against a few rogue tears. Seth deposited his cup on the floor and pulled his daughter fully into his lap, tucking her head under his chin. "Daddy, why do I feel so sad?"

Dean took a quiet inhale at that, heart hurting for both of the people curled together at the foot of the couch. To his credit, Seth simply began swaying slightly, his own grief of a few moments before wrapped up and pushed away in favor of his baby's. "You feel sad because you loved Kevin, and he's not here anymore," he said simply, still swaying, "and there's nothing wrong with that. You should feel sad. He was your friend, and you took very good care of him. But you know what helps with the sadness?"

There was a little hiccup and a nudge of curls against his chin as she repositioned herself. "What?"

"Remembering the good times we had together. Like the time you put all those bows on his ears." There was a tiny, short giggle, followed by a soft sob. "Or the time you were stuck in the mud and Kevin ran between the back door and you barking until I came out to find you."

"Or the first time we taked him for a walk when we moved here, and he got scared of the big white birds?"

"Exactly like that," he murmured, and he felt arms slip around him and pull both of them closer to a narrow, warm chest. Gratefully, Seth rested his head on Dean's shoulder, feeling the tears slip slowly down the side of his face and grow into a warm spot on his chest where Aveline pressed her face. They kept sharing memories, in ever decreasing sentences, until their grief tired them out, and Dean was the only one left awake, rocking the two people he loved and feeling his own face grow damp.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you who aren't psychotically addicted to animal-related social media, about a month or two ago the Johnsons adopted two French bulldog puppies. On September 29, one of the two, Brutus, ate a mushroom that was toxic; within hours, his liver and immune system were irreparably damaged, and the family made the call to end his suffering and put him to sleep. The item was posted on the Rock's facebook page. 
> 
> Cuddle your pets tonight, guys. And take the time to find out some of the common threats to your pets in your area.


	5. Dance lessons, or Learning curves

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is dedicated to (the fabulous) leadusnot, Britt_B, and KailynnYukari for their comments on chapters 3 and 4. Thank you so much for the encouragement, guys, and I mean that for everyone who's reading, kudos-ing, and commenting. Getting feedback makes this so rewarding (I also appreciate ideas for future chapters! Don't worry, lead, I'm working on yours ;]).

"Dean?" The voice was sing-songy and faux patient, and he lifted his eyes from the screen of his phone to find a thoroughly bored Aveline. "What are you doing?"

"Well, why don't you find out?" He offered her the phone after switching the mode it was in, pointing to a list of pictures. "I made it so that if you pick a song on here, it will play through the TV's speakers. Because your daddy is technologically impaired."

There was a shouted grumble from the hallway that he paid no mind to, because Dean watched the little girl's eyes light up as the song came through the speakers, and she jumped off his lap to grab her father's hand as he emerged and tug him into the cleared space in the middle of the room. Seth had been on his way into the kitchen to get dinner started for them--tonight he'd picked up a shift at the bar, so he'd only woken up an hour or so before, but he had still insisted on cooking. Organization was a big thing with him, Dean had recognized, and even when he picked up extra shifts or worked late he still stuck to the same schedule with strict tenacity. He most likely also suspected that the nights he didn't cook Dean fed both himself and Aveline with fast food, and he wasn't particularly fond of that idea. Not that he was against fast food, it was just that the little one was obsessive about collecting the toys from the kids' meals and there would be hell to pay if she couldn't complete the lot. He was showered and dressed already, the black button down he wore to the bar open and floating around him, his hair carelessly tangled into a bun to get it out of his face and off his neck, cologne--light, subtle, a little woodsy--drifting through the air around him like a cloud of effervescent happiness.

"Dance with me, Daddy," and it was more a command than a plea, with just enough _please_ in the tone that he relented and allowed himself to be dragged. Really, that girl was a master manipulator, at least where Seth was concerned. He took her tiny hands in his and swung her in a low arc, releasing a peal of laughter that cut way too close to Dean's bones with warmth. The two moved in a shuffling sort of wiggle around the cleared space, Aveline's face suffused with joy despite her apparent concentration, Seth's downcast gaze soft and almost reverent, almost painful for Dean to watch. He loved that little girl so much it was frightening; in fact, six months ago, seeing that much love in anyone's eyes would have sent him screaming for the hills. And now, he was practically living with the man, helping to raise that little ball of sunshine, and seeing the two of them in this moment made his heart twist and constrict in sheer confusion that he had been lucky enough to find them. Blue eyes met quizzical molten brown ones, and he shook his head with a quirked smile.

Seth seemed ready to say something or even to pull away, but the music had slowed, one song sliding into the next, and Aveline reduced the distance between them, pressing close to her father's legs and lifting her small feet to stand on his. She arched her feet to stand on tiptoe, which brought her up to the astonishing height of his hip. He wrapped one arm around her, steadying her and rested the other on her hair, playing with a curl that had escaped her braid. Her arms wrapped around his legs, holding tight as they swayed. His face curved into an infinitely tender smile, eyes cast down again; at an opportune moment, he knelt and captured the child, bringing her up to wrap her arms around his neck and rest her forehead against his chin. In that moment, watching them, the small brunette and the tall black-haired man, a sudden, intense ache struck Dean. He saw instead of the little girl a preteen, and a teenager, and an adult, watched with glassing eyes as she grew up and moved on, finding someone to love, maybe having children of her own, and the fear of all that was yet to come in her life gripped him intensely. Was he really equipped to handle all the trials that she still had coming? What advice could he really offer in cases of friend troubles or picking colleges or what she wanted from her life? A feeling of crippling inadequacy made his hands shake. Was he prepared for this? Did he deserve this?

Suddenly two small hands wrapped around one of his shaking ones, tugging insistently. "Dean, dance with me!" He looked up into bright blue eyes, eager and excited, a tiny pouting mouth stretched wide into a smile. "Dance with me! Unless--unless you don't want to..." The smile crumpled and the hands stopped tugging, her arms falling to her sides and playing absently with the frills of her skirt. The little face was shielded by a waterfall of messy curls that had all escaped the hairdo or otherwise been worked loose, so she let out a squeak of surprise when strong arms swept her up and spun her around, holding her tightly to him.

"Of course I wanna dance with you, sweetheart. You just have to teach me." She giggled brightly and pushed on his chin, resting a hand on either side of his mouth and rubbing at his stubble.

"Then you have to put me down, silly!" Dean did as requested, and for the better part of the next half-hour he followed every instruction and criticism that she offered (and there were many; he was clearly not the dancer she had anticipated he would be). Seth poked his head out of the kitchen to chide her, trying to control his laughter, "Aveline, it's not nice to tell Dean his feet are stupid. And anyway, dinner is ready. Come eat."

The drill instructor left him seated on the living room rug, muttering something in childish petulant tones about "it's not mean if it's true," and from this vantage point he could watch as father seated daughter at the kitchen table and offered her a plate of what looked like breaded chicken and sliced peppers, as she settled herself and he corrected her as she ate with her fingers, as she stuck her tongue out at his back as he dropped dishes into the sink. The inadequacy was still there, significantly quailed, but ever present, and yet the warmth was back, blooming in a place in his chest that wasn't quite his heart. A two-toned head poked out of the kitchen, indicating the second place at the table he had just set, and brown eyes were sparkling. "Come on, your dance coach says you need to take a break anyway."

Dean hauled himself to his feet and walked to the table, planting an out-of-the-blue intense kiss on the man next to the sink and leaving him a little dazed. The little girl less than eagerly gnawing on the red peppers immediately started in on his dance technique again, and he listened with only slightly feigned interest, making amused faces at his boyfriend who shook with silent giggles. Maybe he wasn't entirely prepared for this whole situation, and maybe he would never feel as though he was, but he also couldn't imagine what his life would be like if he didn't have either of these people.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been on a pop culture kick, I guess. This was inspired by Bindi Irwin's beautiful dance on DWTS.


	6. Reasonable, unreasonable

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, guys, over 1100 views. That's... amazing. Thank you so, so much. I'm so glad you're all liking this story as much as I'm enjoying writing it. Here's a long update to make up for the long wait. 
> 
> This chapter dedicated to Britt_B and leadusnot for their comments. You're gonna need a bucket for this one.

Carmella knew something was wrong the second Seth walked in—slumped in, was more accurate. He didn’t look up from the floor as he dragged himself across the room and slipped under the bar, muttering a perfunctory “Hey, Mella,” as he tied on his apron. He shambled around behind the bar like a zombie, totally silent and clearly on autopilot. The first time he actually looked at her was when she shoved a glass of cinnamon whiskey under his nose and pointed to the stool in the corner.

“Sit. Drink. And then tell me what the fuck is up with you.”

The dark-haired man began to protest, but she shook her head, mouth setting in a no-nonsense line, and pushed him into the seat. Something like relief surfaced in his expression as he quailed before her—she often had that effect on men, something about the angles in her face, her boyfriend had told her—and gulped the fingers of liquor. His eyes were stormy, mudslides in the aftermath of a quake, and red-rimmed, which told her just about all she needed to know, but she stayed quiet, leaning against the rich wood of the bar and wiping glasses and bottles clean until he cleared his throat.

“Thanks, Carmella,” he murmured, scrubbing at his jaw with one hand. “I can always count on you to beat me up when I need it.”

She laughed, setting down the glass she had been trying to get a particularly stubborn lipstick stain off of—she made a mental note to yell at Eva next time she came in—and taking a swig of her beer before turning to grab a cutting board and some limes. “Honey, you don’t need no more beating up. You walked in here like a kicked dog. Wanna tell me why?”

She watched the doors slam shut in his expression and watched him slide back into his defensive mask, forcing a neutral expression. “It’s nothing.”

“Seth Rollins,” and her tone brooked no argument, but the chef’s knife in her hand pointed at his chest certainly helped, “that is some bullshit.”

She busied herself wedging the citrus fruits, turning to grab a few lemons, and throughout the process she could practically feel the battle of his emotions raging behind her. Carmella had early developed a sense of how best to encourage (sometimes gently, sometimes less so) people to give her the information she was after, and she had known Seth for almost nine years: he was basically putty in her hands. It helped that he wanted to talk about it—if it hadn't been her there, she was almost positive he would have toughed it out for his whole shift—and she knew she had him when a deep, long-suffering sigh behind her indicated his giving in. The tall man bellied up the bar beside her with a knife of his own and stole her cutting board mid-fruit. She stuck her tongue out at him and dropped her weapon into the sink with a clatter, busying herself with filling up the rest of the garnish tray (pre-sliced cucumbers, peels of ginger, maraschino cherries, mint, tiny plastic swords).

“I—uh—I snapped at Aveline tonight.”

Carmella crushed a cherry between her thumb and forefinger, deliberately stopping her actions to wheel around and face him. His shoulders were hunched, face very carefully angled to his task; from her perspective, she got a good look at the tight lines of his jaw and the puffiness of the bags under his eyes. Even his hair was less carefully pulled back than usual, and several artificially blond strands had escaped to curl against his neck. He had moved on to the lemons, and the knife met the cutting board with a forceful _snap_ between each wedge. One cut was a little awry and the blade sank into his thumb, and he swore, setting it down and shoving the finger in his mouth. After a moment, he released it and slumped wearily forward over the bar, pressing his hands heavily into the counter.

“I’ve been working a lot lately—”

“Every night for the last three weeks,” Carmella supplied quietly and not quite smugly.

“Yeah. Like I said. A lot. And she’s got a cold, something she picked up at the park, so she’s been clingy, and tonight she was just not having my leaving. She completely broke down.” His voice quieted, the next sentence almost a whisper, “She asked me how much I make an hour, then broke her piggy bank—the one Vic—the one her mom gave her—and brought me all the change. She was sitting in the hallway, in tears, handing me all the money she saved up from her birthday and begging me to stay home.”

One of his fists balled, crushing an unfortunate stray lime wedge, and he continued, now almost inaudible, “Dean was standing in the kitchen, trying to help, trying to calm her down, and she—she yelled at him, totally furious, _‘I don’t want you, I want my **real** daddy, I wish **HE** could stay here instead of you!_ ”

Carmella exhaled slowly, reaching out to rest a hand on her friend’s back. She realized when she touched him that he was trembling, fighting to maintain control of himself, and for once she wasn’t sure what to say. He started when she touched him, then chuckled softly, mirthlessly, turning to rest his tailbone against the lip of the counter. “The expression on his face—it was just like someone turned a light off. And I… I just lost it. I grabbed her arm and walked her into her room and put her in bed, snapping the whole way about how she’s a spoiled brat and how could she say something so mean and not true, and she was crying even harder, because she’s _four_ , Mella, she’s got a one track mind, she just wanted me to stay home, and now I’m mad and Dean’s feelings are hurt and she didn’t get what she wanted, she's totally alone now.”

“That’s heavy shit, Seth,” the blonde agreed, filling two glasses with another two fingers of whiskey and handing him one. She realized too late she had given herself the lipsticked glass, decided she didn’t care, and spun the sticky purple print away from her mouth and gulped. He drained the liquid in a single gulp, setting the glass down on another wedge of lime. They were going to have to cut more at this rate—and probably wash more glasses, too—but she couldn’t quite bring herself to care.  

“That’s not the worst part. When I came back out to the kitchen, Dean was putting on his boots and bike helmet, said something about needing to go for a ride, clear his head. She shook him up bad, and his face was just… it was just totally blank. Like I said, light turned off. He didn’t kiss me goodbye when he left, and he wasn’t back before I left. Nat’s sitting right now.”

“Thank god for that,” the New Yorker muttered, finishing her glass and staring acidly at the opposite side of it. She was going to fire Eva, she decided. After tonight. “But you won’t need her.”

Seth’s eyes, somehow more tumultuous after their heart-to-heart, flickered to hers without comprehension. “Wha? But, the bar, and—”

Carmella set her glass down and took his, resting her free hand against his. “Seth, you’ve worked twenty-one nights in a row. I can work six. Eva’s coming in tonight, we’ll be able to handle it. Go home. Make up with your boyfriend and cuddle with your kid. You need some sleep anyway, you look like shit. Remind me to stop scheduling you so much. I abuse my good workers, you know that.”

He blinked at her, once, twice, then engulfed her in an enormous hug that nearly toppled her and knocked both of their glasses off the edge of the sink where she had balanced them. He went for the broom, apologizing, but she took it from him and shooed him away with a flap of her hand, clucking her tongue the way she’d learned from her very Jewish grandmother. “Go home, baby, get out of here before I change my mind.”

He was out the door before she finished her sentence, and she shook her head, sinking to the floor to pick up the larger pieces of glass. “Men.”

 

* * *

 

 

Dean’s motorcycle wasn’t in the driveway when he got home, and his heart sank. Maybe he was spending the night at his own apartment. He couldn’t blame him, really, but the listlessness of that face when Aveline had turned on him haunted Seth. He shuffled into the side door, kicking his nonslip work shoes off and bending down to massage his already aching feet. He should really invest in a bicycle, or something else that would shorten his twenty minute walk to work; the bar was just far enough away that the walk was annoying but just too close for him to be able to justify driving there.

“Nat?” he called, softly, surprised to find the living room empty and dark. Usually, the neighbor took full advantage of his Netflix account, and his recommendations were now inundated with weird cooking shows (cupcakes seemed like the most inefficient form of making war he’d ever heard of) at all times. He was a little worried, since the door had been open, so he pulled out his phone to see if she’d texted him; maybe she’d run over to her house to grab something? There was nothing from Nat, but there was a single message from Dean. Seth swallowed and closed the app, not having the heart to have it confirmed in writing that he would be sleeping alone tonight.

Well, maybe not. He did have some making up to do with the smallest member of the house, after all, and waking up in Daddy’s bed might go a long way toward soothing the nasty words over. He crept toward her room, not really paying attention, until the hairs on the back of his neck stiffened: there was someone in the room with her. He could hear a voice murmuring just below his ability to pick out specifics, and he paused, desperately trying to figure out who it could be. It definitely wasn’t his designated babysitter—her voice had a different cadence. He slipped closer, peeking into a room dimly lit by a glowing butterfly nightlight, and caught some of the speech.

“I don’t know what I’m doing, I really don’t. I’m makin’ it up as I go, princess. But I’m trying hard. I’m sorry I’m not very good at it. But—you’re just—little girl, you’re so amazing, and I’m so proud of you, and I’m—I’m so damn lucky that I get to be in your life.” There was a poignant silence, punctuated with a deep breath. “I’m sorry I left you earlier. You wanted your daddy, that’s all. I miss him when he’s busy, too. He hasn’t had a lot of time for either of us lately.”

Seth inhaled sharply, the words slicing to his core as easily as wire through soft cheese, and pressed a hand to his mouth, willing himself to stay quiet. Dean’s voice was low, soft, and labored, like he was fighting for every word. He probably was. “But he’s just doing what he thinks is best for you. He wants to make sure you have everything you deserve.” Another loaded pause. “I do too. You deserve the whole world, little one. Whether or not that includes me. I don’t know. But… but I really, really hope it does, more every day.”

His eyes had adjusted, so he could make out the shape of Dean, still in his boots and jacket, resting near the middle of Aveline’s bed, leaning down to press his forehead to the small one in bed. Since the little girl hadn’t said a word and didn’t stir at the touch, Seth knew she was asleep, but that just made the whole scene crush his heart even more. He wasn’t supposed to be seeing this, it wasn’t staged for his benefit; and yet, he would never have guessed there was this much turmoil behind the playful smile that he woke up to every morning. He was so deep in his own train of thought that he almost missed the final sentence, murmured just audibly.

“I love you, Avi.”

Seth’s breath rushed out of him in an involuntary gust, and he stumbled against the opposite wall of the hallway with a soft _whump_. They’d only been together four and a half months—and yet, it was four and a half months that felt like an eternity, that he was terrified every morning he was going to wake up from and that he couldn't quite convince himself he wouldn't wake up from. He could see the rest of his life in the room in front of him, and it exhilarated him. There was no edge of fear there had always been before, no inklings of dread for the future.

He hadn’t let himself think this way yet, too wary from years of disappointments and reams of rushed decisions, but hearing those words in that voice—

He loved Dean.

“Seth?”

The shorter man lifted his eyes, meeting confused blue ones, and it was all he could do to keep his feet. It was there, laid out as bare as if it were written in black ink on his forehead, and he had the strangest urge to laugh. Dean carefully closed the door behind him, rubbing sheepishly at the back of his neck, and in the small hallway Seth was enfolded in the smell of him, the faintest hint of cigarette smoke encircling a dab of ink and paint and leather and sweat and _home_.

“I didn’t think you’d be getting back until after two or three. I sent Nattie home. She seemed surprised to see me. Look, I’m real sorry I left, I just—I wasn’t prepared for that, and I handled it badly, and after I rode around and thought for a bit I felt terrible—”

Seth grabbed either side of the unzipped motorcycle jacket and pulled him in, bringing their mouths together a little clumsily before easing into a more tender and apologetic kiss. Dean responded immediately, even though Seth could feel the surprise in the tentative way his lips pressed, then pulled back, then pressed back in, until they were kissing soft patterns on the side of his mouth, each long, lingering kiss punctuated by another that was shorter, gentler, almost teasing, questing, asking and answering questions without words. For right now, it was all Seth could offer—there was just too much going on in his head, all the thoughts swirling and tangling and colliding into one mass of _desperate to say it_ and _not sure how to_ —and they stayed that way for what could have been hours, until Seth pulled back and rested his forehead against Dean’s, their noses brushing.

“I got the night off,” was all he said, and it was so little in the face of what had just happened that he giggled, and Dean joined in, until they were both laughing full, deep, belly laughs, and Dean wrapped his long arms around Seth and pulled him close, pressing his lips to a dark hairline. Seth traced the pattern of the words on the collarbone against his lips, soaking up the moment. This was enough. This was so much more than enough.

On the other side of the door, a little girl rolled over, smiling sleepily, and murmured, “Love you too, Daddy Dean.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I REFUSE TO APOLOGIZE.
> 
> Also I don't know why, but I am married to the idea of Carmella as a bartender/restaurateur. It just happened.


	7. In sickness and in health

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter's plot was suggested to me by leadusnot. Thanks for your eternal, unflagging patience. 
> 
> Dedications, as usual, to all my commenters: Britt_B, leadusnot, and ChristineRedfield. 
> 
> Thank you to everyone who's stuck with me thus far... this chapter plays with a new kind of POV, so please let me know how it works or doesn't work for you.

Seth hated being sick. He hated the pain that crawled at the edges of his awareness, not quite enough to justify taking anything but more than enough to make him irritable and sharp at the corners. He hated the thick stuffiness of his breathing, the way he couldn’t keep his mouth closed because it felt like he was suffocating if he did, and he hated the gasping, choking coughs that wracked his entire body and left his chest and ribs aching without relieving any of the scratch of his throat. Most of all, he hated the waves of dizziness and nausea that played havoc with his movements, one crushing him the moment he tried to stand up and the other swirling in for the kill as he lay in a crumpled, pathetic heap on the bed. This was not going to be a fun weekend, especially since he was supposed to work that night, and the next, and the next… He groaned and rolled over in bed, curling into a ball to attempt to protect himself from the onslaught of bile that rose in his mouth at the thought of the bar. He was _so_ not going in.

And yet there was still no rest for the weary, because he had to take Aveline to preschool and go grocery shopping and one million and two other tiny bullshit errands—and for once, he didn’t have Dean to rely on, because he was desperately struggling with his latest project and had spent the last three nights in his own apartment, and he would be lying if he didn’t admit how much he missed the blond’s presence—he attempted to release his knees, and that was apparently the Very Worst Idea, because the simple straightening of his legs caused the mild caress of queasiness to explode into an all-consuming supernova of _I need a trash can right this second or I am going to be buying a new mattress_ , and he barely made the lunge to the receptacle in the corner of his room before he was heaving, atrociously, convulsively. When the spasms finally calmed, he pressed his head into the rim of the can, panting ferociously, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand and discovering to his utter joy that there was blood mixed into the vomit. “Fucking terrific,” he muttered, as another swell of nausea overcame him, and he leaned forward to fill the trash can further.

He was so consumed by his suffering that he didn’t notice a pair of eyes peeking through the crack in his door and quickly running away.

 

* * *

 

 

Dean was about four sheets of paper deep into his design when his phone rang. He ignored it the first time, focused on a tiny detail in the crown molding, but when it began to ring again, insistently, he sighed and threw the pencil down, scrubbing at his eyes. This project had been a complete and total nightmare from the start, and he was getting nowhere fast with both the architect and his own creative impulses, so he couldn’t say he was too upset to be interrupted. He was pleasantly surprised to see Seth’s number show up on his phone, too. He hadn’t spent the last few days with them, and he was thoroughly uncomfortable with how weird it felt to be in his own silent apartment. It had only taken the few months of their relationship for him to grow accustomed to the noise and bustle of a place with other people and to think of Seth’s apartment as home, and he pretty much only came back to this place to work or to gather the ever-dwindling reserves of his clothes left here.

“Good morning, handsome. You’re up awfully early.”

“Daddy’s sick,” a tiny, worried voice squeaked, and suddenly his entire morning changed.

“Aveline? How did you get your dad's phone? Wait, sick? Baby, what do you mean?”

“He’s sick and he’s making weird noises in the bedroom. Like blech, but a lot of times. And he’s sitting next to the trash can.”

 _Oh, fuck_ , Dean groaned internally, keeping his voice carefully neutral, “Okay, princess. I’m gonna need you to do something for me, okay? You go sit with your daddy until I get there.”

“Okay,” came the slow agreement, after a moment, and he could practically hear her nose wrinkling, but the concern in her childish voice was palpable, too, when she added, “Dean? Is Daddy gonna be okay?”

“Your dad is gonna be just fine. You did good to call me. That was very smart. I’m just gonna get some medicine and then I’ll be right over, okay?”

“Okay… Dean?”

“Yeah, sweetheart?”

His heart dropped a few places in his ribcage when her voice cracked and she murmured, “Please hurry.”

 

* * *

 

 

Seth had made it to the bathroom, eventually, after about the third round of heaving, and he lay on the tile floor, relishing in its coolness on his forehead. He was dimly aware of a figure a few feet behind him, standing in the doorway, but he brushed it off as the cat, closing his eyes and doing his best to calm the raging fury in his gut. He gasped aloud when a small hand pressed to his temple and ran back through his sweaty hair, eyes flying open and head lolling to the side to stare into what would be a comically serious tiny face under other circumstances. Circumstances that didn’t involve stars swimming around her eyes and the world going eerily brown and spinning at the edges.

“I am here, Daddy,” she said, her tone again almost too serious, still gently stroking his hair back from his damp forehead. “Oh, princess,” he tried to say, but it came out as more of a hoarse “hnng” as he gripped the toilet and dragged himself upright to convulse more of the nothing out of his stomach. It seemed to last forever, until every part of his body ached from the force of his straining, but when he came back to himself, tears pooling at the corners of his eyes and dribbling down his cheeks, she was still there, toilet paper in hand to wipe mostly ineffectually at the wetness on his face, her other hand resting lightly against his face.

“I am here,” she repeated, firmly, and he could have cried at how sweet the moment was, except he had to lean back into the bowl of the toilet for another round.

 

* * *

 

 

Dean was pretty sure everyone in this drugstore was judging him, but he could have given two flying fucks. He plopped the two fully-loaded baskets on the counter, overflowing with at least one of each different brand of cold and nausea medicine in every conceivable form—liquid; pill; gelcap; chewable; hell, even children’s—and topped off with a few bags of cough drops, boxes of crackers, cans of soup, popsicles, a bag of rice, and finally completed with three separate eight-packs of sports drinks (one of each brand they carried). The dark-haired cashier who looked as though she’d never seen sunshine blinked at him, then at his haul, and cracked her gum twice.

“This for that little girl you always bring in?” she asked, pleasantly enough, and on any other day Dean would have been flattered to know that she recognized him and Aveline, or surprised to find that she spoke with a soft British accent, but as it was he was in no mood to mince words.

“No,” he said shortly, and British cashier raised an eyebrow at him, but finished ringing the transaction with incredible speed.

It was only when he got to his car he realized she hadn’t charged him for any of the children’s medicines or the popsicles, and there was a smiley face scrawled in sharpie at the bottom of his receipt.

 

* * *

 

 

It had been ten minutes since he’d thrown up last, so Seth cautiously moved back from his defiled porcelain throne an inch, then two, then a foot, and curled into a shaking, sweaty ball on the floor. Aveline was still next to him, her warm hand pressed to his shoulder, worry practically vibrating her body, and he reached up to rest his hand on her arm.

“You’re being such a big girl,” he murmured, voice hoarse and lips cracked and dry, and he knew he had to look like a total disgusting mess, but the tentative smile his praise elicited was the best thing that he’d seen all day. “I’m so proud of you, Avi.”

“You always take care of me when I’m sick,” she responded, smoothing his hair back from his face again, “but I wish I was bigger so I could help you.”

His protest died in his throat as he heard the doorbell ring. He tried to drag himself to his feet, wondering who the hell it could be, since they certainly weren’t expecting anyone, but Aveline beat him to it with a squeal of half relief and half joy, darting to the door before he could call a caution after her. He balanced himself heavily against the bathroom door frame (as far as he’d made it before the dizziness reared its ugly head again, and under any normal circumstances he would have been to the door screening the entrant before his four year old could get there, but he wasn’t quite in his right mind at the moment), staring blearily in what he hoped was the direction of the front door. A familiar rasp set him to weaving again, because what was Dean doing here, how the fuck had he known—and then he was on the ground, everything spinning and pitching wildly, and everything hurt, oh god, why did everything hurt, but suddenly a pair of warm arms wrapped around him and pulled him up, and he was helpless to do anything but make awful blubbering noises and gestures, and then it was too late and he was retching, his abused body convulsing yet again, and the bile in his mouth was burning acid in the dry heat of his throat.

“Seth, I’m here,” came the comforting murmur, and he was dimly aware that he was over the toilet again, so he spit weakly, then slumped back into the warmth of the chest that cradled him. Calloused fingers rubbed gently at his temples, and then he was back in bed, and he didn’t remember anything else.

 

* * *

 

 

Dean sat at the edge of the bed, watching as Seth tossed and turned, at a loss for what to do now. His boyfriend looked awful; his eyes were sunken, buried in bags that resembled Hefty 20-gallon outdoor trash bags in both size and color, and his face was a peculiar shade of white-gray that made him think of chalkboard dust, decorated with a feverish flush that made his cheeks stand out a livid red against the pallor. His lips were chapped and cracked, and strings of foam-flecked mucusy vomit dangled from the corners of his mouth. In short, he was Not a Pretty Picture.

First things first, he thought, grabbing a towel from the bathroom to wipe away the worst of the caustic residue. Next, though, next presented a problem. In an ideal twist of events, he would get some medicine down the dark-haired man, and that would take care of the problem. However, judging by the active nature of his restless sleep, he didn’t see that as a likely possibility. He was startled out of his labyrinthine conundrum by a tiny voice from the doorway.

“When I’m sick, Daddy rubs stuff into my chest to help me stop coughing, and then he snuggles with me.” _Out of the mouths of babes, comes salvation,_ Dean thought, hurrying to the bags still piled in the doorway where he’d dropped them when Seth collapsed. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, willing away the spike of panic that had settled in his chest when he’d watched his boyfriend fall. It had been almost like slow motion, the snowy color of his face, the way his knees crumpled; it had quite possibly been the scariest moment of his life. He rooted through the bags, finally coming up with a miniature tub of Vick’s vapo-rub, thanking every deity he could think of that he’d actually bought some along with everything else.

Once he brought the tub in, sensing his apparent lack of clarity on what to do, Aveline took over with a huff, smearing a wad of the heavily-scented waxy spread over her father’s bare chest (Seth would ask, later, about where his favorite tank went, and she would sheepishly show Dean the safety scissors and the shredded shirt, on pain of death that he never tell). It seemed to work, or, at least afterward he was resting more easily, and the little girl nodded and turned to announce to her assistant, “Now, we need some of the medicine. Daddy always gives me the bubblegum-flavored kind to make me less hot. And then popsicles!”

“Popsicles? We're gonna wake him up to eat?”

“No,” she responded, very seriously, “for me. Being a doctor is hard work.”

 

* * *

 

 

Seth woke up feeling considerably less awful about two hours later, pressed between a pair of bodies. They were talking in low voices, so it took him a few moments to grasp the thread of the conversation.

“—really really likes you. Like a whole lot.”

“Well I really really like him, too. Very much.”

“Do you like me?” There was a slurp, followed by a raspberry sound, and a tiny giggle.

“Of course I like you, silly pants. You’re my favorite four year old.”

“Then why don’t you stay all the time?”

Seth sucked in a breath, hoping it wasn’t too obvious that he was awake. The body on his left shifted, dropping his head onto an arm, and he realized he’d been resting on Dean’s chest for his whole nap. The thought made warmth crawl through his belly. “Well,” and it was obvious that Dean was very carefully considering his words, “it would be very fun to stay here all the time. But your daddy and I have only been together for a little while. I don’t want him to get tired of having me around.”

“He won’t!” was the instant (and only a hint petulant) protest, “He even told me, he wants you to live here. And I do too! You should stay all of the time!”

“Oh, sweetheart,” and there was infinite tenderness and brokenness in the tone that made Seth’s jaw tighten, and Dean moved, the body that had been pressed into his right side settling between him and the other. “Oh, Aveline. Just because I’m not here all the time doesn’t mean I don't want to be.”

“Then you should stay,” Seth murmured, before he could stop himself, and he felt Dean’s body tighten along the length of his. For ten seconds he regretted speaking up, until a soft chuckle released all the tension. An arm draped across his stomach, fingertips pressing into his hipbone in time with the press of soft lips to his forehead.

“So that’s what this is, huh, an ambush?”

"Yep, I got sick specifically for the occasion," Seth chuckled hoarsely, nuzzling into his neck, and there was a tiny squeak from the space between them.

“I can’t breathe! Stop being lovey and let me get out!”

Dean and Seth both burst into hearty laughter, rolling apart until a decidedly disheveled Aveline emerged to glare fiercely at them. Seth wriggled over and once more pressed himself into the warmth of Dean’s embrace, murmuring, “I’m serious. You don’t have to, but you’re welcome to stay. For good.”

There was silence for a moment, the sound of serious contemplation, before, “In sickness and in health?”

Seth smacked him with a pillow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man, this chapter fought me tooth and nail. I literally started working on it before chapter 3. But it's finally out. So there, muses. It was also aided by the fact that I currently have the Cold from Hell, so I had some real-life inspiration.
> 
> And, of course, if you have a suggestion or bunny for me, please, share.


	8. Halloween isn't typically the family gathering holiday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The usual dedications to my commenters: ChristineRedfield, Britt_B, calla753 (Joelle and Aveline playdate coming!), EclipseBorn, leadusnot, DeansDirtyDeeds (swimming is coming too! ;]), and Hyacinthus. 
> 
> Also, seriously, guys, thank you to every single reader. Over 1500 views and over 100 kudos. Thank you so freakin' much.

Dean clung to the stanchion, his little island of peace amidst the howling chaos of screaming children and frazzled parents. There were sparkles clinging to every piece of him below the waist, his head pounded from the artificially sweet smell pumping in from the candy store next door, and he was going to make Seth repay him in backrubs for a month for this.

He was in hell. Glittery, sugar-scented, fluorescent, screeching hell.

“Would you mind taking her costume shopping, he asks. It would be a huge favor, he says, and besides, it’ll be fun. Lying bastard,” he muttered to the ceiling, scrubbing at his jaw with a hand. It hadn’t even been a choice; between melted chocolate puppy dog eyes and desperately joyful pleading blue ones, it wasn’t as though he was capable of saying no. And, really, the trip had started out okay: Aveline had eaten her lunch in record time, including vegetables (Seth insisted she eat two of them with every meal, which Dean found ridiculous because “I can only name like four vegetables,”—he was pretty sure he was going to have to repaint the wall behind him where Seth’s glare had struck) and she had bypassed both a toy store and a candy store in her haste to get to the costume shop (Dean was actually a little disappointed about that, because that particular candy store had bulk displays of sour strips). Once they were inside, however, things began to go south. As it turned out, Aveline had her heart set on being a particular princess that year—whichever one wore yellow, he couldn’t remember—and _of course_ the store was out of her size. The little girl had displayed a remarkable capacity for adaptation, however, and had summarily changed her pick to a different princess—which the store was entirely out of in any size. A pony-tailed sales associate had swooped in at that point, a knight in painted-on skinny jeans with a denim vest, and directed them to the “generic” section of the store with a wink. Dean didn’t trust anyone who could stomach this much noise with that wide a smile, but he could have kissed him.

So now Aveline was practically hidden beneath a sea of mint green “Archer Princess” dresses—they came with an astonishing lack of archery equipment, he noted—digging for one that looked like it might fit. They had already waded through “Beauty Princess” and come up empty-handed; though she was holding it together well, Dean could see the frustration building in the violence of her tiny movements, the way she flung each dress behind her a little harder than necessary. It made it easy to keep track of her, at least, but he felt like a failure. He couldn’t even help her do _this_.

A small body clunked into his knees just then, burying its face into the side of his jeans and gripping his legs firmly. “They don’t have it,” she mumbled, tilting her chin upward. Her jaw was set in resolution, but her lips trembled a bit, and unshed tears threatened at the corners of her eyes. “They don’t even have the dumb dress.”

He knelt next to her, brushing a stray curl away from her forehead and settling his hand under her chin. “Avi, did you want the dress?”

She scuffed her foot against the tile, kicking up a mini-puff of dust and glitter, once, twice, then nodded. One of the tears escaped, dripping directly into his open palm, and he scooped her up to sit on his shoulders, draping one leg over each side of his neck. “Then it’s not dumb. I wish they had a million of the dresses for you, so I could buy every single one. And you could wear them every day. That sound like fun?”

She had giggled at the sudden flight and at his hyperbole and now clutched at the crown of his head, sending a shower of sparkles cascading down his chest. He sighed inwardly, clenching his jaw; he should have thought about it beforehand, because she was absolutely coated in the shimmery stuff, but a happy child was more important than how much fun Seth was going to make of him when he got home. Which reminded him, they should get out of this hellhole before anything else went wrong.

“Are you ready to go, princess? Maybe you’ll have better luck somewhere else with Daddy.”

“I’m ready. But… can we go to the candy store maybe?” He could practically hear her eyelashes batting. “Since they didn’t have my dress…”

“Of course, little one,” he laughed, taking one hand off her leg where it was steadying her to tweak her nose. His tone was mock-stern as he continued, “But you’re only getting one pound of candy. And it has to last until Halloween.” Aveline settled and let out a contented sigh, all thoughts of Halloween costumes chased out of her mind by the prospect of candy. Dean played the gratification game well.

Suddenly she giggled again and again squeezed her arms around his scalp, causing another glitter shower to fall on his shirt. But he couldn’t quite bring himself to care when she leaned forward and planted a kiss on his forehead.

“I love you, Dean.”

“I love you too, Avi.”

 

* * *

 

 

Paradoxically, the lack of costume gnawed at Dean the whole way home. Aveline practically passed out in her booster seat in the back, clutching her pound and a half of candy (Halloween was almost a whole _week_ away, after all, and he wasn’t heartless), and hadn’t mentioned anything about it the whole time they had been in the candy store. But he caught the way her smile had faltered when they left and passed a pair of kids holding bags from the costume store, a frilly yellow hem poking out of the girl’s. Maybe he was a sucker, but he couldn’t stand disappointing her where holidays were concerned (he already had a veritable stockpile of Christmas presents sitting in his apartment, for both child and father; Seth just shook his head, and Roman delighted in mocking him).

While they were idling at a red light, about five minutes from the apartment, his phone buzzed. Lazily, he glanced over at the lighted screen—it was a text from Roman. And suddenly, the heavens opened up and Dean shouted, “That’s IT!” loudly enough to make Aveline start awake and blink owlishly at him. Sheepishly, he apologized, and she settled down again, turning to watch the streets drift drowsily past. It seemed to be taking a very long time, longer than it had when they had left, and she sat up to see unfamiliar, huge houses with big yards instead of the small condo-style apartments that marked her home neighborhood.

“This isn’t the way home,” she announced, suddenly nervous, seeking the reassurance of his eyes in the rear view mirror. He chuckled, softly, and glanced back at her.

“I know, little one. But I think I found a way to get you that costume.”

 

* * *

 

 

Aveline wasn’t at all sure about this. Dean had parked the car in front of a two-story house with bricks in the front and a porch with a swing at one side. She craned her neck as he lifted her out of the car and could barely make out a swingset with a slide in the backyard, along with the pink roof of a plastic toy house. Was this his house? Was this where he went when he wasn’t with her and Daddy? She clung to his hand on the walk up to the door, hanging a little behind. There were some toys in the grass—a hula hoop and a scooter with purple handlebars. There were more toys littering the floor of the porch, mostly Barbies, and an intense swell of jealousy overwhelmed her for a moment. There was another little girl here that Dean hung out with!

She sulked behind his leg as he knocked, kicking at a half-built Megablocks house. She was still trying to process the betrayal she felt at learning there was another little girl in his life when the door opened, and she saw the biggest man she had ever seen in her entire (admittedly brief) life. She immediately cowered behind Dean completely, though out of terror rather than petulance now. The man was as tall as her daddy and at least twice as big, and she noticed with equal fear and interest the dark lines that covered one of his entire arms. She loved tracing the lines of her dad’s tattoos when they were snuggling, and almost against her will she stepped forward to get a better look at the careful whorls and patterns.

The man crouched and extended his arm, offering her a better view of the whole thing, and she glanced cautiously up at him. He was smiling, and his eyes were smiling too, so she dared a tiny smile of her own and reached out to touch the ink. He turned his hand over as she followed a line, and she giggled when she saw the tiny sea creature just under his wrist.

“Ah, you found the turtle, huh?” His voice was rumbly and deep but soft, and she glanced up into his face again to see his smile was just as soft. “That turtle is for my little girl. Her name’s Joelle. I think you and she are the same age.”

Aveline wasn’t sure how she felt about this information, because she wanted to be mad—how dare Daddy Dean have another little girl—but it was really really hard to be mad in front of this man. Finally, she looked up into his face again and said, quietly, “My daddy has tattoos too. But he doesn’t have any for me.”

Dean released a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding and squeezed her hand. “Aveline, this is my friend Roman. Roman, this is Aveline.”

Roman took her hand and shook it, very stiffly and formally, which made her giggle again. “It’s very nice to meet you, Aveline. Do you have a nickname?”

She shook her head, then paused and thought a moment, using her free hand to play with an unruly curl. “Well, sometimes Dean calls me Avi.”

“Well, I think I like Aveline better. I asked because we don’t call Joelle by her whole name. Her mama and I call her Jojo most of the time.”

“Is Jojo here now?” she asked, suddenly nervous and shy.

“Nope, she’s out grocery shopping with her mom.”

Dean sighed again, shaking his head. “That’s too bad. I wanted the two girls to get to meet.”

Roman glanced up, easing out of the crouch with a groan. “Well, if you wanna hang out, I’m sure they’ll be back within the hour.”

“Nah, man, we were supposed to be home like twenty minutes ago. I actually came over to ask a favor.”

“Well, at least come in and get a drink, then, while you ask. We’ve got juiceboxes.”

Dean and Aveline followed Roman through the house while he gave an abbreviated tour—mostly just pointing to the various rooms they passed and naming them—and she found herself deliberately shuffling her feet when they passed a room he called the “play room.” Dean noticed her hesitation, and Roman must have too, because he just nodded and Dean released her to explore. She quickly discovered an extensive collection of princess memorabilia and Lego sets, and she was gone.

Meanwhile, in the kitchen over a glass of water, Roman stared coolly at a fidgeting Dean. Finally, after less than a minute’s scrutiny, the smaller man broke, holding up his hands. “Okay, okay, fine, I admit I partly wanted you to meet her. But I also really have a favor. Does Jojo still have that Belle dress she wore last year?”

Roman made a distinct _mm-hmm_ rumble in his throat and crossed his arms. He was still silent.

“So…?”

A dark eyebrow arched, because they had been friends for almost fifteen years and he knew exactly how to peel away the layers and make Dean squirm. They both knew he wasn’t just here for the costume.

“Fine! What do you think, okay?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think,” he replied, almost instantly, draining his glass of water and fixing Dean with an inscrutable expression the former had less-than-lovingly declared the Samoan Eye Torture. “What matters is what you think.”

“I think she’s pretty damn perfect and I’m in love with her and her dad and I’m thinking about moving in with them and I’m kind of sort of fucked in a big way.”

The Samoan blinked, then chortled shortly and disbelievingly. “I never thought I’d see the day Dean motherfuckin’ Ambrose admitted to being in love with anyone—let alone a man with a little girl.”

All he could manage in defense was, “Hey, I said her first.”

He had to pat Roman on the back to keep him from choking as he laughed.

 

* * *

 

 

Dean carried Aveline and a duffel bag in the door a full hour and a half after they had been expected, and he studiously avoided Seth’s eyes until she was safely ensconced in her bed to complete her nap.

“I, uh, I got the costume. Shoes and wand and everything.”

“I see that. Mind explaining where you’ve been for the past four hours?”

The blond sheepishly rubbed at the nape of his neck, flushing down to his collarbone as he mumbled.

“What was that?”

“We’re invited over to Roman and Galina’s for swimming and dinner next weekend. To return the costume.”

Seth’s mouth gaped, and Dean pressed a kiss to his jaw, humor sparkling in his eyes.

“Get ready to meet the closest thing I’ve got to family, sweetheart.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cue dramatic, suspenseful music. 
> 
> So here's the requisite (sort of) Halloween chapter. You're welcome for the images of Dean covered in sparkles, by the way. 
> 
> This is becoming ever-more directly chronological. Hmph.


	9. Miserable weather, bad clients, and worse lunk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter goes out to all my commenters: calla753, leadusnot, Syreina, DeansDirtyDeeds, and Britt_B. 
> 
> The concept for this chapter came from Hyacinthus' recommendation of more Carwash and national cat day (which I did not realize was this week?).

Dean pressed his forehead to the fogged window, gaze following the streaky pattern that alternated with the sliding raindrops. It had been raining solidly for at least four days, which was easily the longest stretch of time in recent history that it had precipitated in the desert he called home; it wasn’t as though the city didn’t need it or even that he _disliked_ rain, but at a certain point enough was enough. He sighed and peeled himself away from the gloomy view, rubbing at his eyes and wondering if it was too early to give up on this client and call the meeting off. He’d only been waiting for ten minutes, after all, and traffic _was_ deplorable because of the condition of the roads.

He glanced outside again as he took his seat back at the tiny table, crammed into the corner of the surprisingly busy coffee café, trying to keep his attention focused on his hot chocolate to drown out the overriding noise and keep his eye from twitching. He had hoped fewer people would venture out due to the apocalyptic conditions of the roads, but no such luck, of course. The weather was wearing his nerves to stubs, and it wasn’t as though they were fully functional to begin with. It also certainly didn’t help that Aveline had picked up a (thankfully, mercifully milder) strain of the flu that had struck Seth the week before and had been the picture of absolute despair in her little bed when he had gone in to kiss her goodbye an hour ago. If it had been up to him, he would have stayed curled up in the bed with her all day feeding her popsicles and medicine, reading her stories, meeting be damned, but Seth (a gentle humor not quite quashed in his serious expression) had pointed out that she should be sleeping most of the time anyway, so he should probably calm the plans to enrage his newly acquired client, and had nudged him out the door.

However, the tables had turned, and now the newly acquired client was the one grating on Dean’s last fraying strand of patience. He had already gone through a cup and a half of hot chocolate, and the meeting time had been thirteen—no, fifteen, now—minutes past. Generally, he was a forgiving person in terms of time management considering his own skills were basically nonexistent, but there was a sick little girl at home, and he would much rather have been fussing over her than wasting gas to drive to a coffee shop in the middle of nowhere to be stood up. He drained the last dregs of his beverage, wiped his mouth, and tugged a pen out of his laptop bag (borrowed from Seth, because it lent him “more prestige” and also prevented him from crumpling his contracts too badly before they got into customers’ hands) while simultaneously calling over a roving busboy.

“Hey, I was supposed to meet a chick here. If she shows up—name Stephanie, uh, Stephanie H, something—give her this, okay?”

Dean stuffed a wadded-up napkin and a five-dollar-bill into the busboy’s sticky free hand, not waiting to clarify his understanding, clapping him on the shoulder and heading for the back entrance where he’d left his bike parked on the concrete next to the building’s sign, mostly out of the rain and haphazardly covered with a tarp. Maybe riding a motorcycle in this deluge wasn’t his greatest idea, but it was certainly faster than crawling along the roads with all the other cars, and he was pretty confident in his abilities on the thing. He shook the crumpled plasticky blue tarp out a bit, succeeding in sort of making it a little less wet, before folding it along ridges worn with use and sliding it into one of his saddlebags. He paused for a moment, forehead crinkling, because he could have sworn he heard a soft mewl, but he shook it off, tugged on his gloves, and reached for his helmet (kept tucked safely under the saddlebag, doubly protected by the tarp and the leather; normally, he would have just taken it in with him, but Seth had begun pointing out to him that maybe it would be a little more professional for first meetings if he possibly kept it with his bike, because “people didn’t necessarily trust architects who had motorcycle helmets covered in tiny metal spikes. Maybe”).

He paused again, because the helmet was slightly heavier than he remembered, and there was a distinct mewl this time, and he was pretty sure there was a claw in his finger. Slowly, he brought the Kevlar sphere closer to his face, holding it practically between one finger and his thumb, and there was another very distinct noise, followed by more claws sinking into his unprotected finger, and there were narrowed, gleaming eyes peeking out at him from the semidarkness of the foam insulation. All he could think was _shit, again?_

“Alright, kitty, time to get out of there,” he muttered, shifting the helmet’s weight to the crook of his arm to reach in and drag out the protesting trespasser: the tiniest, dirtiest, wettest kitten he could ever have imagined. Once the animal was exposed to the cool air again, it mewed pitifully, wriggling somewhat less than effectively in Dean’s hand. He adjusted his arm around the bulk of plastic, reaching under the kitten’s jaw to probe for a collar. Immediately, the kitten butted against his fingers, purring loudly enough that he could hear it over the rain and traffic sounds, tilting its head to stare unblinking green eyes into his face.

He couldn’t exactly put the thing back down on the street _now_ , could he? The kitten continued purring and headbutting at his fingers, stopping every so often to fix small, wide eyes on his face, and he sighed heavily, leaning his hips back against the motorcycle and bringing the cat closer to his face. “I’m in a tough position here, you see. You have put me into a tough position. Because if I take you home, Seth will kill me. He just lost his pet, see, and I don’t think he’s at all ready for another one. But if I put you down, my conscience will kill me. But I can’t go around rescuing every stray I see, hm?” The kitten wriggled again, making a small meow and pressing its wet nose to his knuckles.

“Fuck.”

He sighed, defeated, and tucked the ferociously purring, damp ball of fur into the inside pocket of his riding jacket. There was a wriggle of protest before the cat realized it was both warm and dry, and by the time Dean had gotten his helmet on and the bike in gear, it was asleep. He patted the imperceptible bulge in the leather, shaking his head and muttering, “You are going to get me kicked out of my bed tonight. I hope you’re happy.”

There was a little hiccup, a small breathy sound of quiet comfort, and Dean realized he was turning into a big damn softie.

 

* * *

 

 

Seth was asleep on the couch when he got home—finally, some luck in his day—so he made his entrance into the apartment quietly, slipping out of boots and creeping across the creakiest parts of the floor with his heart pounding in his ears. Another stroke of good fortune struck when he found Aveline awake in her bed, playing quietly with some of her dolls, and she squeaked a raspy greeting. Dean grinned at her, sinking onto the mattress next to her and holding a finger to his lips.

“Think you can keep a secret?”

Her blue eyes sparkled, and she nodded, pantomiming zipping her lips and crossing her heart. He glanced toward the door, thinking about whether it was worth the effort to close it and decided against it, before reaching into his jacket and withdrawing the now-very-dry-and-warm kitten. The little girl squealed—well, tried to, but her voice sort of gave out halfway through, so she made a half-yelp of joy that subsided into a wheezy croak, and despite himself Dean snorted out a laugh. The kitten itself just shook its head and blinked in perplexity at the strange new person, yawning and stretching languorously in the space between Aveline’s feet and Dean’s thighs. She reached out a cautious hand, eyes darting between the fuzzy baby and the bringer of the surprise until he nodded, and she carefully ran her fingers down the length of the little creature, who immediately flopped and began purring like a lawnmower. Her eyes were as wide as saucers, and he was pretty sure he’d never seen that much pure joy in anyone’s expression in his lifetime. Definitely not when it came to anything he’d done.

He was taken aback when she lunged forward and flung her arms around his neck, burying her face into the soft part of his shoulder under his collarbone. Evidently, the kitten was as well, because it mewled in irritation and rolled off the bed to begin exploring the pile of toys and laundry scattered next to the bed. He wrapped an arm around her back, bringing her whole body into his lap and pressing a kiss to her hair; it took him an extra couple of seconds to realize her tiny chest was heaving, and he tilted back in alarm to find that tears were coursing down her cheeks.

“Avi, Avi, what’s the matter? Did I do something wrong? Are you hurting?”

She shook her head, pointing to the kitten and hoarsely mumbling something as she continued to cry. Now he was thoroughly confused. He had hoped seeing the little fuzzball would cheer her up and make her confinement in bed more bearable (and as a byproduct ease his guilt about leaving her that morning), and instead she was sobbing fitfully in his lap, apparently worse than ever. He took her face in his hands and rubbed the pads of his thumbs under her eyes, soaking up and diverting some of the fresh moisture. She was noticeably warm, with flushed cheeks, and he was beginning to think this had been a terrible, terrible idea and it was time to wake up Seth. “Aveline, I need you to talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”

“It’s so cute,” she rasped, finally, blinking more wetness out of the corners of her eyes and adding, “I’m so happy.”

Dean’s head felt like it collapsed off his neck from the weight of his embarrassment. He had made her so happy she started to cry? This feelings bullshit was not his strong suit. He leaned forward and kissed her hair again, resting his chin on top of her head and closing his eyes. Every single piece of clothing he had on was at least a little damp, he had probably (undoubtedly) lost one of his most potentially lucrative clients ever, and he was most likely (absolutely) going to be sleeping on the couch tonight, but at least he had managed to make his little girl smile. Well. Sort of.

She was shaking again, more deliberately this time, and he leaned back again to see that she was pointing desperately at the door. He blinked at her once, then blinked at the door, and then the crushing realization that he should have closed it struck, because nowhere in his line of sight was the kitten.

“Shit,” he groaned, snatching up Aveline—blankets and all—and darting for the hallway. No sign of the troublemaking beast there, which meant—oh no. He secured his burden against his chest and crept around the corner, scanning the floor, the bookshelf, _anything but the couch please_. The little girl in his arms was gesturing again, somewhat frantically, and with rising horror and a sinking feeling of resignation he followed her point to the couch where Seth was sprawled out, with a now familiar small shape walking unsteadily on his chest. The body shifted, draping one arm over his face, and the kitten froze, sinking to its haunches inches from his chin. Dean could practically see the wheels turning in its small head, but he was still praying to every deity panicked thought could muster _please don’t please don’t please don’t please_ —

And then it meowed, loud and long and insistent.

Dean groaned again, his face falling. Even from his lowered gaze, however, he watched as Seth stiffened, very deliberately lifted his arm, and tilted his head to look down at the occupant of his chest. He was greeted with another equally forceful meow, and the kitten closed the inches between his jaw and began rubbing vigorously on his stubble.

“Dean,” and the addressed closed his eyes, but he could feel Seth’s gaze burning a hole in his forehead even behind his lids, “I think you have something to tell me.”

 

* * *

 

 

**Postscript:**

A full thirty-one minutes after she was supposed to meet with one Dean Ambrose, a decidedly furious brunette in a power suit was working on decapitating a particularly unfortunate busboy purely with the force of her voice. She finished her tirade and threw the crumpled napkin he had handed her when she walked in back in his face, stomping out and slamming the glass door with all the force her rage could muster.

“Sheesh, Heath,” crowed an obnoxious tenor from the back of the shop, attached to a slicked back head of blonde hair and a pair of laughing blue-gray eyes, “what the hell was on that note?”

The redheaded busboy, cowed despite the fact that he had at least five inches on the angry woman, unfurled the abused napkin and read the somewhat blurred message with a slowly spreading grin.

_Mrs. Stephanie H, it is my understanding that in the world of professionals, there is a saying that goes something like—well, I don’t remember exactly but it means get your ass to meetings on time. Enjoy finding someone else to design your three story clusterfuck of a house. Warmest regards, your former designer_

“If that dude ever comes back, his drinks are on me,” Heath called over his shoulder, pinning the napkin to the corkboard next to the register.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A nice little fluff break between family stress chapters. Fear not, the meeting of the families is still happening. Just needed to get this out first.
> 
> Also wow I didn't intend to include that many cameos but it happened. Bonus points if you can get the not-busboy.


	10. Family dinner

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dedications to KailynnYukari, leadusnot, DeansDirtyDeeds, and Britt_B for their comments. 
> 
> Shoutout to leadusnot for giving me the idea with the fingernail polish. :D

Dean shouldn’t have been worried: Dinner with the Reigns family was a smashing success.

There were a few hairy minutes at the outset, where the adults made awkward small talk and the girls stared each other down, tucked behind their respective daddy’s protective legs, but with all the ease of four year olds, they seemed to come to an agreement and Aveline, to Seth’s eternal chagrin, announced, “It’s okay that you have another little girl if it’s her, Dean,” and Joelle nodded, and the two bounced off to play, hand in hand and chattering happily. The remaining three adults burst into hysterics at the sputtering fourth, and the conversation hadn’t let up since. It turned out that Galina was a fantastic chef—“She keeps me fed, which is not an easy task,” Roman had interjected—and since Seth was no slouch in that regard—“He makes me eat vegetables. Like a real adult.”—they became fast friends over the discussion of the intricacies of preparing various dishes and moved into the kitchen, still engrossed in the debate of hand-shredding versus shredding with a food processor, to pour glasses of wine and procure beers. Of course, Dean and Roman didn’t really have new ground to break, but watching their significant others interact was interesting enough.

After a moment, Dean’s forehead crinkled. Roman stifled his own grin behind his hand; the normally cool and aloof man looked downright concerned. This thing with Seth must be really serious. “There’s a lot of hand-waving and violent gestures. Should we check on them?”

Roman spared the moving pair a glance and shook his head, flopping almost gracefully into a seated position on the couch. “She’s Cuban and Italian. That’s her being reserved.”

Dean snorted, flopping with much less effort into the armchair next to the bigger man. “Seth’s hit me a couple times when he’s gotten really into it. So, you think she likes him?”

The subject change was so abrupt, and the tension in his tone was so palpable, the Samoan straightened and reached out to rest a hand on Dean’s bouncing knee. “Dean. Relax. You’re not on trial here. Neither of you are. It’s just dinner.”

With an explosive sigh, the blond flopped back somehow more deeply into the cushion of the chair and scrubbed at his face, kicking his legs up onto the edge of the coffee table (it stilled the shaking minimally, Roman noted). His voice was somehow softer and raspier than usual as he spoke. “I know. I just… fuck, Rome, I really lo—I really like this one. Like… possibly the gooey bullshit kind of like where I don’t let him go.”

Roman’s grin was soft and lopsided and not entirely focused on Dean, more like somewhere over his left shoulder, and Dean couldn’t help but look behind him to see Galina and Seth still tangled in conversation, though they were laughing now, both of their heads thrown back. Seth caught his eye and winked, running a hand back through the blonde patch of dark and catching his fingers in the tie of his bun. Dean shook his head and grinned, goofily, as he turned back to the searching grey eyes of his oldest friend.

“All I’m gonna say, man, is you look at him like I look at her.” Roman stood and clapped him on the shoulder, indicating the dining room. “Go round up the munchkins, it looks like it’s dinner time.”

 

* * *

 

 

Dean found them in Joelle’s room, Aveline meticulously inspecting the paint job she’d just finished on the slightly older girl’s toes. Both small faces beamed up at him when he knocked, and before he knew it he was pinned against the bed, a forty pound girl child attached to each of his hands and begging “can we paint your nails, Dean?” He was useless against the onslaught of puppy dog eyes, both blue and brown, so he sighed heavily and sank to the floor, extending his fingers in the accustomed manner.   

“Gotta be a quick trip to the salon, though, girls, it’s time to eat. Mama and Daddy are expecting us downstairs.”

“It will be!” the twin voices chorused eagerly, before they set upon his hands with glittering powder blue polish and a vengeance. As they worked, they talked amongst themselves, until he had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. Soon enough, though, they finished, and they could hear the heavy tread of Roman’s feet on the stairs, and Dean withdrew his hands to shake them vigorously in an attempt to dry their work faster. He could feel his friend’s bemused stare without even looking up, so he settled for inspecting his newly blue tips. Surprisingly, the two would-be estheticians had done a remarkably clean job.

“Alright, ladies, time to close up shop,” Roman rumbled, and Joelle giggled and wrapped herself around his legs. “I see you worked over time again today.”

Aveline’s eyes were wide as she watched the huge man pick up her tiny friend and settle her on his broad shoulder. Joelle wrapped her arms around her father’s neck and giggled again, pointing down at his bare feet—which sparkled with alternating blue and pink polish on the toes. “My daddy is the best,” she sighed before immediately shrieking with glee as she was dropped and caught in warm arms, one covered in intricate black swirls. A familiar bellow echoed up the staircase (“Aveline! Dean! You’re holding everyone else up!”) and the man in the pair lumbering toward the stairs threw a look over his shoulder to encourage the other two to follow.

Dean shook his hands one more time, especially vigorously to be safe, and grinned at the remaining little girl. “Well, I guess that’s our call, huh, little one?”

She surprised him by wrapping her arms around one of his legs and looking up at him with a strange expression. He swung her up into his arms, planting a kiss on her forehead. “Why so serious, hm?”

“Joelle’s wrong,” she murmured, very seriously contemplating his face.

“Oh? About what?”

“Her daddy isn’t the best. Mine is.” She pressed her forehead to his scratchy chin, tiny arms snaking around his neck, and a lump formed in his throat beneath her elbow. The puddle where his heart had been was pretty sure she hadn’t been talking about Seth just then.  

 

* * *

 

 

The meal itself was loud and boisterous and wonderful, as far as Dean was concerned. The adults lingered over not-quite-empty plates far after the little ones had been excused, and he was thrilled to watch Seth completely at ease with both Galina and Roman. The dark-haired man was naturally charming—hell, he was a bartender, people skills were pretty much part of the package—but he had still been nervous, in some deep unaccountably fluttery part of his gut, and seeing all three of these important people getting along eased a knot of worry he couldn’t have identified until it was gone.

The conversation wound down as all four adults found themselves yawning, and they reluctantly agreed that yes, they were in fact old people, and as such they should probably call it a night. They found the girls curled up together on the couch over a photo album, TV playing some soothing cartoon in the background, messy dark hair of two textures fanning out as far as the eye could see, hands entwined (all three of the mature adults cooed and fawned and snapped pictures on their phones, and Dean felt the familiar buzz of a text and caught the wink from Seth that spoke volumes). Gratefully, he pulled the dark-haired man in for a kiss, nuzzling his nose for a moment that he would be eternally thankful Roman was too involved in extricating the knot of sleeping four-year-old to notice.

Having collected their sleeping bundle, the Ambrose-Rollins household made their goodbyes and promises for another visit, and after Aveline was safely in the carseat, after they thought they were safe, Roman caught the kiss they shared in the fading light of the overhead light of the car.

Galina wriggled under his arm and pressed a kiss to his shoulder, looking up at him with a grin from ear to ear.

“A man with a kid. If I hadn’t seen it, I never would have believed it. What funny sense of humor fate has,” she murmured, practically purring against him as he carded through her hair. “Our boy’s done found himself the one, I think, baby.” Roman rumbled a soft laugh, pressing a kiss to the top of her head and moving away. She couldn’t resist peeking out once again at the retreating taillights, adding, “I wonder if that’s why I caught Dean looking at that empty house on the next street over last week...”

She ended up having to whack Roman between the shoulders with a book to get him to breathe again.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So family meeting ended up being a quick, short, fluffy thing. I'm sorry, guys, I didn't have it in me for this chapter. I promise, next chapter will be heart-wrenching. 
> 
> And fear not, the kitten's name will be revealed. :D


	11. Too early

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Over 2000 hits, guys. Wow. Just... wow. Thank you so much. Have a second chapter in 24 hours. 
> 
> Dedications to Britt_B, Neffectual, SurviveEternity, leadusnot, and ChristineRedfield. 
> 
> ~~sorry for the emotional trauma~~

Seth knew something was wrong the second Aveline walked into his bedroom.

In the first place, it was six AM. It wasn’t as though he’d been sleeping anyway—that damn fuzzball Dean had brought home had taken a shine to him, for some reason, and insisted on sleeping on and around his face (and purring violently and loudly to add insult), so he’d just gotten up for the third time to move the furry monstrosity to the foot of the bed next to Carwash with a grumble of “at least one of you behaves.” He’d considered kicking Dean’s leg for good measure, too, but the man was for once sleeping like a freight train (he usually slept more like glass bottles being carted on the train), and he wasn’t that heartless. He had just settled back against his pillow, debating whether or not he should get up for real and unsuccessfully trying to trap the kitten between his and Dean’s legs with his feet when there was a small sound in the doorway, and he looked up to find Aveline in fully disheveled pajama mode clutching one of her princess dolls (she was favoring Merida lately, he had noticed).

“Daddy?” she mumbled, face very composed and serious, “is it okay if I come snuggle with you?”

He wasn’t even remotely capable of resisting that plea, so he simply nodded and adjusted, opening his arms to her as she scrambled into the bed. He noticed with a pang that she made it all the way onto the mattress without his help—she had grown at least an inch over the summer, and now she didn’t need his guiding hand to pull herself up. But her little body still fit snugly against the contours of his chest, even if her feet dangled a bit closer to his knees, and her head tucked the same way under his jaw, her curls getting tangled in the remnants of his beard and invariably finding their sneaky way into his mouth and nose. He loved every itchy second.

Aveline sighed softly against his neck, one of her hands absently playing with the tangled coils of his unruly hair, and he rubbed her shoulder. It wasn’t often anymore that she crawled into the comforting protection of Daddy’s bed; there had been a time, not long before, that he wouldn’t have been able to pry her from his side with a crowbar, but he had also been less than discouraging of her attachment. He squeezed her suddenly, tightly, and she let out a soft squeaky noise of surprise. That she was so quiet was his second hint that there was Something on her mind, because despite the early hour, once she woke up she didn’t stop talking. But he also knew that since she had sought him out, she would bring the subject up in her own time, so he decided just to enjoy the peaceful cuddle time.

“Daddy?” Her voice was barely audible, so soft he almost didn’t hear it over the shuffle of Dean switching positions behind him. He vaguely wondered if he should be concerned about her seeing the two of them in bed together, but it wasn’t as if he could do anything about it now, and it certainly wasn’t as though she hadn’t seen her mother and him in similar positions before, while together and afterward.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“I had fun with Jojo last night,” she murmured.

“I saw you two playing together. You seemed like you were having fun,” he acknowledged, leaning back and pulling a few of her hairs away from her forehead. She stayed as she was, face downcast, refusing to look up at him and pressing her fingers together.

“I liked Mr. Roman and Mrs. Galina too,” she finally continued, pulling her hands apart and tugging on the middle finger of one. Seth was confused but held his peace; this didn’t seem like the kind of thing that she should be concerned about telling him. She was quiet for a moment longer, and then for the first time she lifted her face to look at him.

“Is Mrs. Galina like Dean to Mr. Roman?”

Seth snorted as quietly as possible, and if he didn’t imagine it, he could have sworn he felt Dean’s back moving rhythmically behind him. “Sort of. Mrs. Galina is Jojo’s biological mommy, though.”

“Bio-log-eh-cal?”

He shifted, pushing himself more upright on his elbow and running a hand through his hair as he fought to come up with an explanation. It was too early to be explaining the birds and the bees to her, and not just because it was quarter after six in the morning. “It means she gave birth to her.”

Blue eyes widened in comprehension, and an unmistakable film of concern took over. “So—Mrs. Galina is like Victoria?”

Hearing that name from her mouth was like a physical blow. It wasn’t as though she didn’t know where the extra presents that sometimes showed up came from (a running track record of 2 successful holidays out of 3 Christmases and 2 birthdays had taught him to keep his mouth shut and his expectations lowered) and she was certainly smart enough to realize that most other kids had a female parent pick them up from preschool sometimes. But knowing something in his head was different from knowing it in his heart. Seth swallowed the lump that had risen in his throat and nodded, not quite trusting his voice.

He was surprised by the venom in her tone when she asked her follow-up question: “Does that mean Mrs. Galina gonna leave Jojo?”

“Why would she—oh, Avi. Oh baby, no. No she’s not,” he croaked, reaching out and resting a hand on her shoulder. “Mrs. Galina is not going to leave her. She loves Jojo very much.”

As he spoke the words, he had a vivid mental image of Father Time rewinding the space-time continuum by ten seconds for the sole purpose of smacking him in the face and stopping the last part of that sentence from coming out of his mouth. The wounded expression that spread across Aveline’s face—eyes widened and just a little bit too shiny, a hint of bewilderment warring with a hurt she should have been too little to have etched so deeply in her core—may as well have been a slap; he would probably (definitely) have felt better about himself if she had smacked him.

“But… Victoria left us,” she started, her voice again that almost inaudible murmur, lip trembling ever so slightly. “Does that mean she doesn’t love me?” Seth opened his mouth, then closed it, then opened it again, because it was too fucking early for this, and that was clearly the exact wrong thing to do because she repeated, a little louder, a little more forcefully, lip trembling a little more, “Does that mean Victoria doesn’t love me?”

Seth was grasping at straws, desperately foraging through his brain for any sort of answer other than the blunt one that the most selfish part of him wanted to give, watching the already too-big pain grow in his daughter’s eyes with every second that he paused, until finally he gave in and decided the truth was the only thing he had to tell her. “Aveline, Mrs. Galina and Victoria were in very different situations… Mrs. Galina and Mr. Roman love each other very much and are very happy together. Your mom—Victoria and I… we loved each other, but we weren’t happy together.”

Someone had told him once that having children was like giving your heart legs and letting it walk around outside your body. He was pretty sure that person would have no helpful advice for the moment when your heart broke itself right in front of you. “Was that because of me?”

“No, Aveline, that was between us. Your mom—she left because she wasn’t ready to be with one person forever. It wasn’t your fault. It never had anything to do with you, princess. It was grown-up stuff.” Seth pulled her into his chest and wrapped his arms around her, burying his face in her hair. “Victoria wasn’t ready for any babies.”

“Were you ready?” She had struggled to pull herself far enough away to look at his face and succeeded in creating a triangle of space between their bodies that she drew her knees up into, tucking her arms around herself. “Were you ready for babies?”

He smiled, slowly, warmly, thinking about the very first time he had seen her, wrapped in that tiny pink bundle, big blue eyes blinking slowly at him from behind the plastic nursery window; the way she had pulled herself up with the edge of the coffee table at only six months and had plopped right back down in shock when he laughed at her in delight; the myriad nights he had woken up to her little curly head under his arm because they had fallen asleep in his bed watching cartoons. “I was ready for you,” he finally murmured, looking into her eyes and watching the warmth creep back into them. “I was ready to have my Aveline.”

The tiniest of smiles curved her lips, and she uncoiled herself from her ball and snuggled back up against his chest. Her fingers were cold and her feet were positively glacial, especially tucked against his hips, but she sighed in contentment when he wrapped his arms around her and pressed kisses into her messy hair, and he wouldn’t have given the moment up for the warmest socks in the universe.

“Princess?”

She responded with a sleepy “hm?” that made his heart melt.

“Wanna look through some of your baby pictures later today?”

There was a movement he assumed was a nod against his chest, and he tightened his hold on her. He wouldn’t have changed a second of his life if it had meant never having this moment, never having his baby girl.

Well, maybe a couple seconds, to push that damn kitten back down to the foot of the bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In honor of all of you reading this, have **so much** emotional turmoil!
> 
> This is pretty directly chronological. Huh. Whoops.


	12. The Party: i

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god, guys. Almost 2300 hits. You're **incredible**.
> 
> Dedications, as usual, to my commenters: DeansDirtyDeeds, Britt_B, leadusnot, SurviveEternity, and ChristineRedfield.
> 
> As requested, more kitten ~~and more emotional turmoil yaaaaaaay i mean what~~!

“Do I _have_ to wear a tie?”

“Oh my god. You are literally worse than my _four year old_. No, you do not have to wear a tie. When did I ever insist that you wear a tie,” Seth grumbled the last part, adjusting his own tie before turning to the mirror and studiously ignoring the shirtless man slouching peevishly against his doorframe. This argument had been steadily building for two hours, ever since he had woken up and started getting ready for the annual bar staff get-together Carmella hosted each year to perk everyone up before the craziness of the holidays kicked into full swing, and he was d-o-n-e _done_ talking about the subject. His boyfriend, however, was not. 

“You said _dress up_. A tie is insinuated by the term _dress up_ ,” Dean replied, the sarcasm in his tone approaching level four, defcon **lethal**. Seth just shot him an annoyed glance in the mirror and scrounged blindly on his dresser for a hair tie with one hand, the other holding his hair in a coil at the nape of his neck.

“Fuck, why is everything I own black—I meant dress _nicely_ , and you know it! Like you would for a client meeting. It’s a staff party at a bar. Not a—ha, there you are, you little fucker!—black tie gala.”

“You’d be able to find your hair ties if you would put them in a single place instead of wherever you take them off,” the taller man muttered, turning into the bathroom and tossing, “And, for your information, I wear ties to some of my meetings” icily over his shoulder, punctuating his sentence with the click of the door as he disappeared. Seth flinched at the noise, and—it was practically cinematic—on cue the elastic in his hand snapped around the ponytail he had just finished perfecting. He held the band of betrayal by the middle, staring at its frayed ends with a frown slowly creasing his mouth, hair collapsing in disarray around his face. He then flopped back onto his bed, very deliberately covered his face with the nearest pillow, and screamed until he got dizzy.

After he had exhausted the capacity of his lungs, he allowed his arms to collapse, only absently noting that a small weight had descended next to him. When the descent was followed by a series of tiny paps that crawled up his leg and onto his chest and the settle of a tiny purring mass directly on his collarbones, he gingerly lifted the edge of the pillow up to be greeted with a remarkably loud and joyful “MEOW!” and an insistent brown-and-white ball of fur struggling to crawl under the fabric and closer to his face. He groaned and covered himself again, deciding it was safer for all involved if he were to remain in hiding for now.

Another weight, this one considerably larger than the kitten, settled next to him and rested a hand on his arm. “Um… Daddy?”

Seth grunted a response, too drained of oxygen and emotion to offer any more.

“If you need a hair tie, I have one. P-Princess Spike was playing with it in my room.” Aveline’s tone was apologetic and a hint concerned, as though she recognized the danger of naming the kitten as the culprit but felt compelled to offer some kind of assistance to her beleaguered parent. Seth grunted again, but this time roughly slid the pillow away from his head, down toward the ballistic missile of fur in an attempt to keep her away from his face. It failed, of course, so he settled for turning himself away so that she could only assault the side of it with her particular brand of ferocious and unwanted affection.

“Oh, was she now,” he replied, a little louder than necessary, so that it carried into the bathroom, where the door had been cracked to allow steam to escape. The door snapped shut again, and he couldn’t resist the satisfied smirk that tugged at his mouth. Another strike for him and against the fleabag. Of course, the smirk immediately retreated into the recesses of his fatherly guilt when he saw the distress on his daughter’s face.

“Yeah,” she said, slowly, frowning and extending her arm and resting the black band against his neck. Unfortunately, Spike viewed the action as an invitation to play and leaped for the “toy,” but fortunately her sense of balance was atrocious, so she overshot handily and ended up in a fluffy heap about three inches to the left of his shoulder. Despite himself, Seth chuckled at the kitten, and the little girl joined with her own giggles. “I knowed it wasn’t one of mine because it didn’t have sparklies.”

“Thank you. What would I do without you, princess,” he murmured, rolling completely to his side and smiling appreciatively at her, mindful of maintaining her current positive mood and not letting his frustration spill over into her space. She beamed back, bouncing lightly after the praise, and he noted that her hair had been masterfully pulled off her face and pinned into cascades of fluffy curls and topped with a sparkling sequined bow. She was also dressed in a clean pair of her jeans and a button-down white shirt with a frill—and, of course, covered in sparkles (ever since Halloween she had been absolutely obsessed with glitter, and Seth had no idea why). Seeing her all dressed up, though, sent another stab of guilt through him, this time for his irritation with the man in the bathroom; after all, _he_ certainly hadn’t picked out her clothes nor attempted to put her in them (and getting a four year old to button her own shirt was a _nightmare_ ) and he _definitely_ hadn’t done her hair. He’d been in the shower, barely a functioning human. “Did Dean do your hair?”

She nodded and smiled again, a little shakily, this time biting her lip. “Do you… like it?”

He reached out and bounced a curl, tickling the underside of her chin. “If I could get him to do my hair, I would. That’s how good it looks.”

Aveline giggled, grabbing the kitten and squeezing her to her chest as she wandered between Seth’s shoulder and her legs. “Daddy, your hair isn’t curly.”

“And what does that have to do with it?”

“Dean says,” she replied, and with a passable imitation of the man’s rasp she quoted, “My super special hair magic only works on curls.”

There was a snort from the direction of the bathroom door, and Seth sat up, tweaking her nose, and glanced at the man splayed lazily against the wall. He was still shirtless, but now in a pair of dark jeans that sat a little low on his hips and were practically painted on, damp curls clinging to his forehead and beads of water crawling down his chest and shoulders. With the cloud of steam hazing the background he looked more than a little like a minor Greek god, or, at the very least, a classical hero. Seth ignored the tingle in his gut and wrenched his eyes away to scramble for the hairbrush, but he could feel his face heating because those blue eyes had caught him staring. Hadn’t he been annoyed with him thirty seconds ago? Damn hormones.  

“You can’t tell everyone my secret, or I’ll lose my magic,” the damp god said, swooping in for a peck on the cheek that sent Aveline’s giggles to a shrieking new height. Seth smiled and finagled the last twist of the tie to (finally, _finally_ ) finish his hair before turning and drawing Dean into his own kiss. It was soft and short, but it felt like an apology, and the press of a warm forehead to his and a hand against his lower back to draw him closer felt like an acceptance.

“Now hurry up and get ready. The party starts at 7.”

“So none of your deadbeat coworkers will be there until 8, we’re fine,” he drawled, lazily toweling at his hair; upon catching the patented Rollins’ _So Help Me God…_ look, he rolled his eyes and raised a hand in mock surrender. “We’re like two blocks away, calm down.”

“What’s a deadbeat?” the little princess peeped, blinking innocently between the two men. Seth stuck his tongue out at his boyfriend, gathering Aveline off the bed and bundling her off with some excuse about starting to get socks and shoes on. It never seemed to take less than fifteen minutes, for some reason, no matter the amount of preparation her father gave her. Dean could hear her repeat the question once they were out of sight, and he had to stifle a chuckle in his towel. He and Seth had just made up about the cat; he was tired of sleeping on the couch and had zero intentions of speeding his inevitable return there. Cons of being the one whose name wasn’t on the lease.

Besides, at the moment he had bigger worries, like dressing himself in an acceptable manner. Though Dean would admit to some of the fault in the argument, it had started with a genuine lack of understanding. He had no clue how one dressed for an event of this caliber. _Client meeting_ gave him a place to start, but the man was still kind of in the dark. He stared between two of his shirts in the closet, blinking once, twice, holding one up to the light, then the other, deliberating, before calling into the hallway, “Hey, babe?”

“Yeah?”

 “ _Should_ I wear a tie?”

After his vision stopped including stars, he would be immensely impressed by the fact that the sequined shoe hit him squarely between the eyes.

 

 

* * *

 

 

After watching the little girl with the glistening curls and sparkling eyes charm her way onto Colin’s shoulders for what had to be the tenth piggyback ride of the evening, Carmella had two distinct but related thoughts: first, she would have to try that head tilt and eyelash flutter herself and see if it was as effective in her case (there was a pair of boots she’d been eyeing for months and couldn’t quite bring herself to purchase, but if they were a gift…), and second, woe betide the first boy (or girl; hey, maybe she would take after her father) she brought around. She caught her barback, best friend, and roommate Enzo shaking his head at the tall bouncer, his spiked-up hair bouncing softly with the movement, and he grinned at her over his beer, rolling his eyes in an expression that clearly read _what a fucking softie, right?_ As big and tough as the bouncer looked—and at seven feet tall, he wasn’t exactly hurting for intimidation factor—it was an illusion; he was a gigantic teddy bear where kids were concerned, which was attested to by the trail of little ones that were following him like ducklings around the bar. And Aveline in particular—who was currently perched upon his shoulder like a queen, arms thrown around his neck—was absolutely smitten with him. She thought it was sweet, and the general chorus of “aw’s” that the parade inspired on its turn about the room indicated an overall agreement with her opinion, but she had one eye on her best bartender’s boyfriend.

The pair of them—Seth and Dean—were seated between Enzo and Kevin, her other barback, each nursing beers. Kevin and Seth were deep in discussion on some point or other about their respective children. He had two, a little boy a year or two older than Aveline and a baby girl, and usually all they talked about when they were together was the little ones; it was their bonding point, since no one else that worked at the bar quite understood the struggle of parenting. Enzo had just joined them and seemed more interested in finishing his drink than engaging in conversation, which seemed to suit the brooding Dean just fine. The light-haired man was practically vibrating with jealousy, his eyes never far from the little girl’s post, which Carmella thought endearing and more than a smidge hilarious, since she had spent some time with the man prior to his relationship with her bartender (she’d been working the night of Dean and Seth’s star-crossed meeting, and she’d spent quite a lot of time tending bar over the next six weeks) and therefore been informed in some detail of his previous stance on childrearing.

A ding rang out through the room, halting the flow of conversation momentarily, and Carmella wheeled around, squinting across the distance to see who was operating the fryer. A sunny blonde pixie cut bobbed up and down in the porthole window, and she shook her head, jogging over and rapping her knuckles against the glassy plastic. “Leave it to you, Renee, to cook here instead of home,” she mouthed, pantomiming an exaggerated middle finger to the other woman (after making sure no little eyes had strayed in her direction); hazel eyes had lifted in surprise at the noise, then crinkled in laughter, and a moment later she emerged from the kitchen, operating the swinging door expertly with a foot and balancing two trays, both steaming, one of crispy wontons and the other of bite-size egg rolls.

“For your information, madame tyrant, I didn’t cook them here. I only tossed them in the oil to heat them up,” Renee laughed, tossing her manager a wink and a kiss on the cheek as she passed by. The sizzling trays had caught the attention of the other occupants of the party, and the little blonde wove her way between tables with the practice of a thousand nights (it may well have actually been more than a thousand; Carmella had hired her close to opening, and they were coming up on four years in business) to deposit them on the bar with the rest of the food.

“Okay, ladies and gentlemen, it’s official, the hot food has arrived,” crowed a bright voice from the entrance, and a massively muscled black man, a slightly-less massively muscled redhead, and a miniscule blonde woman entered, all carrying 4 pizzas each.

“Crews, you’re late, I just dropped mine from the fryers!”

“Ah, so y’all don’t want this pizza then? Okay, I’ll go home.”

After much laughter and good-natured shoving, all twelve pizzas were safely deposited on the bar next to the other hot food, and a queue had formed behind them. Carmella cast around for her boyfriend and found him at the end of the line, now childless, laughing and chatting with Enzo and the tiny blonde who had brought in some of the pizzas. She arched an eyebrow at Enzo, who tilted his head towards her, indicating the little girl curled up in Dean’s arms, talking animatedly, with wild flails of the limbs that had him constantly correcting to keep from hitting anyone or dropping her. He was wearing, however, the brightest smile she’d ever seen on his face, and the look on Seth’s face was no less than disgusting adoration for both. The proprietor shook her head, rolling her eyes at her roommate, and headed to the back of the bar, grabbing a slice of pepperoni on her way and ignoring the mock outrage from those in line. She was the boss, screw the rules. “Hottest chick in the line, how ya doin,” she laughed, crunching into the pizza with a satisfied sigh. It was not New York quality, not by far, but it was made by New Yorkers, so it was close enough.

The pair with the child was next, and watching the way Dean tenderly balanced her on one hip and plated her dinner with the other—declining all offers of assistance from a very amused Seth while he made plates for both himself and the other adult—was almost enough to make her spontaneously ovulate. Once they had passed, Enzo gagged behind their heads, and she snorted into her slice of cheese. The carrot that hit him in the forehead seemed to come from nowhere, but Carmella caught the tiny hand retracting for a high-five hidden against Dean’s chest and the repressed shaking of Seth’s shoulders.

  

* * *

 

 

“We have the coolest little girl,” the tall man laughed, once they were comfortably seated, “And did you see that _aim_?”

Seth shook his head, still shaking in suppressed laughter, and pointed at Aveline’s chest. It wasn’t lost on him that Dean had used the plural pronoun in describing her, and he’d deal with and categorize that swell of joy when he wasn’t trying to breathe like a normal person. “Just because we let you do it once doesn’t mean you can start throwing food, okay? That was a special circumstance.”

If the giggles that broke up his sentence weakened his credibility as an authority figure, the solemn agreement in blue eyes didn’t note it. “Of course, Daddy,” she said, seriously, biting into one of the carrots left on her plate. Satisfied that his parental duty had been done, Seth broke down into helpless laughs, nibbling at an egg roll between paroxysms. He didn’t catch the wink shared by the other two.

“Of course, she does have a precedent for throwing things,” Dean murmured after a moment, a little too loudly to be a whisper, causing Seth to choke on his bite. He rubbed at the bridge of his nose pointedly. “And apparently aim is hereditary.”

“Listen, you—that was a totally different situation,” the dark-haired man began, with some heat, finishing his egg roll and beginning to work on a wonton. “First of all, you were being a huge pain in my as—butt. For like two hours.”

Dean clucked his tongue, bringing the little girl onto his lap and breaking one of his egg rolls in half and offering it to her. “Hear that, princess? That sounds like justification to me.” He popped his half of the hot cuisine into his mouth and chewed once, before continuing, “And I think somebody owes at least fifty cents to the swear jar when we get home.”

“I’ll owe fifty cents to your ass when we get home,” Seth muttered, under his breath, and the other man laughed again, bouncing the little girl on his knee.

“That makes one dollar,” he sing-songed, grinning like a Cheshire, and he nudged Aveline in the ribs. “That’ll make twenty dollars. Which is time for a trip to the candy store! How does that sound?” The little girl didn’t answer, which was remarkable especially where candy was concerned, so he bounced her once again and repeated, “How does that sound?”

“Dean,” and her voice was weirdly choked off, which instantly sent both men into alert. She was patting her throat with one hand and waving at Seth with the other, trying to suck in a breath, and immediately Dean clapped her on the back twice. She coughed, but there was no visible ease to her struggle for breath, and her face was starting to turn blue.

“Are you choking? Is something stuck?” She shook her head vigorously and increased the flailing at Seth with her hand, pointing from the plate to her mouth until it clicked, and all color drained from her father’s face.

“She’s having an allergic reaction. Fuck, what did she eat? Nothing has peanuts in it… oh no…” If possible, his face went even whiter, and he wheeled around and shouted to Carmella, “Did we change the oil in the fryers yet?”

“Two days ago, we switched to—peanut oil—oh shit,” she swore, and immediately Seth turned back around and picked her up bodily under the arms. The party had gone totally silent, watching the little girl, whose breathing was shallow and labored, interrupted by horrifying coughs and sickly wheezes. Her face was beginning to color, and her lips were a definite shade of blue.

“Okay, baby girl, I need you to stay with me. We’re gonna get you the epi-pen, and that’s gonna make it easier for you to breathe. Okay, baby? Dean,” he snapped, laying his shaking little girl across one of the longer tables, “call 911. It’s an allergic reaction, anaphylaxis.”

Seth dug into the bag they had brought—luckily, it was right at his feet—and produced the tubular device, uncapping it with trembling fingers he hoped no one else could see. Aveline’s eyes were wide and terrified, and her hands scrambled to grab his. He took a second to squeeze her wrists between his fingers while he warned her, “I have to pull your pants down to inject this. And it’s gonna hurt. But you’ll be able to breathe afterward. And then the ambulance will come, and they’ll help more. Okay, baby?” She made no noise of assent beyond the ghastly wheezing—she couldn’t—but her eyes were less scared, and her fingers curled around his hand with a little less crushing force. Her daddy was here, and he would fix everything. As he tugged the waistband of her pants down (he would be writing this particular clothing company a thank you letter for their inclusion of elastic) and plunged the needle into her thigh, he wished he could be as certain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My first cliffhanger... please don't kill me. 
> 
> I'm so so so sorry it took me so long to get this chapter out; I started a new job last week and it took some getting used to as far as hours were concerned. I swear the next chapter won't take that long (knock on wood, fingers crossed, salt over the shoulder). But have a longer chapter than normal to make up for it! :D
> 
> Also, seriously, guys, y'all are fantastic. I look forward to getting on here and knowing that I'm surrounded by such a supportive and wonderful group of authors and readers. <3


	13. Waiting: ii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dedications to my commenters: WhenItReignsItRoars, DeansDirtyDeeds, leadusnot, and Britt_B (to whom I profusely apologize).

Seth taps his fingers against her wrist in time with the beep of the monitor and wonders how he could have changed the night’s outcome. Maybe if they had left earlier. Later. Maybe if he’d paid more attention to her at the party. If he hadn’t started that second beer.

“Daddy,” she croaks, tiny hand wrapping around his, “Daddy, you’re doing it again.”

He starts, strands of hair falling around his face as he leans forward and presses a kiss to their linked hands, gaining a few seconds to pretend the hoarseness in her voice doesn’t cut through him like a hot knife. If they’d waited to get food. “I’m sorry, baby.”

She blinks at him, lashes still wet and clumped in irregular patches under her eyes where dark shadows pool, the tinge of blue still lingering on tiny pouting lips. “I’m sorry too, Daddy,” she murmurs, closing her eyes and shifting against the plasticky mattressing of the board. “I’m sorry I got allergic and ruined the party.”

“Avi, Avi, it’s not your fault you got sick. Allergies just happen,” he croons, squeezing her hand carefully around the IV and the other various sticky nodes tacked to her tiny, frail forearm. If she hadn’t thrown the carrot. The paramedic, a mountain of golden skin and swirling black ink on rippling biceps that looks oddly familiar, hums in sympathy with him, nodding at the little girl and adjusting one of her monitors.

“Allergies aren’t anybody’s fault, little one,” he intones, voice bright and deep, and she perks up, turning her head to follow the delicate tracery of his tattoos. He catches her gaze and—after a quick glance to Seth to confirm—stretches out his arm and pulls up his sleeve, displaying more of the intricate pattern. Her eyes follow the lines and light up, bright smile creasing her face and it’s like pulling the shades, revealing the true sunshine of her, until she tries to speak and her voice comes out as a squeaky rasp and cough, cough, cough, wheeze. The illusion shatters, and the paramedic shakes his head, coils of dark hair crowding around his face, eyes flickering to the monitor in a way that makes Seth’s heart squelch into his gut. “No, no, no, it’s okay, tuafafine. Just breathe.”

Aveline turns back to her father and struggles closer to him, pressing her hot little face into his forearm, but not before he sees the terror welling up in her eyes. He leans forward again, kissing her temple and aching in his gut to see her in this much pain and not be able to _do_ anything. Some of her curls fall over his arm, shielding the curve of her cheek, and he brushes them behind her ear. If his hairtie hadn’t snapped.

“Daddy,” she says, face still crushed against his skin, eyes darting furtively to his, “you’re doing it again.”

He releases the grip on her wrist, and she flexes her fingers. The papery sheet is crumpled beneath her hand, and he knows she’s as confused and scared as he is. More. She’s in pain, the swelling from the epi-pen puncture visible even under her pants, the cracks in her chapped lips, the livid red of the skin around her IV site. The paramedic, god bless him, pulls out an iPod that’s playing a cartoon—something with monster girls—and she’s distracted, her breath easing slowly from hiccupping coughs to the more stable rasping from before. He kisses her forehead again, murmuring soft stupid nothings into her ear, shielded by the waterfall of curls, until her breathing is deeper and steadier and some of the creased fear eases out of the softness of her face. He leans back once he’s sure she’s asleep and sighs, scrubbing at his face with his free hand, the other still clutched in chubby babyish fingers.

“First reaction?”

Seth jumps, because he quite honestly had forgotten about the dark-skinned paramedic in his spiral of fear, but he meets kind dark eyes that swim in his vision, sees the iPod disappear into a pocket. He also catches the way it takes his shaking fingers a double try to button it. He glances back down at the tiny hand curled around his, remembering a time when it was even smaller, even weaker, but it still clung—

_It had been five months since she’d disappeared—five months since she’d taken his little girl, bolted, and vanished. Five months since she’d told him to fuck off and never contact her again. The courts will never take away my rights, she’d screamed, throwing things into a bag, terrified baby cries punctuating their fight, and you will never see her again. Through the door, slamming it in his face, the cries risen to howls that cut his gut to ribbons. Daddy, daddy, daddy._

_And now, for no good reason, he was staring at his phone on his couch at seven-fifteen, debating cracking open another bottle of whiskey to numb himself, debating calling out again (he was gonna lose this job, yet another one on his growing resume, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to care) and she was calling. He hesitated, staring at the screen with his fingers trembling, not sure if he should pick up._

_Daddy! Blue eyes, wide, tears and snot dripping, hands outstretched over shoulders throwing her into a carseat._

_His desperation overcame his good sense and he hit the call button._

_“Victoria?”_

_Her words struck him like a waterfall, tumbling into his ears heavy and almost gasped, “Oh god, Seth, she’s in the emergency room I didn’t know who else to call we were out of baby food so I was feeding her peanut butter and she just, she just started choking and turned blue and I didn’t know what to do—”_

_“Victoria, slow down,” and he didn’t know he still had this calmness in him, this authority, especially where she was concerned, “Who’s in the hospital? What happened?”_

_“Aveline,” she choked, and his heart seized, fluttered, crawled into his throat._

_“Aveline is in the emergency room,” he repeated, slowly, working to keep the edge of panic out of his voice. “Because you—fed her peanut butter?”_

_“They said she should be fine—a year was supposed to be fine—“ Her voice cut off in a wheezing breath, and for a moment there was only staticky silence, then a soft, hiccupping sob, followed by a broken, “I can’t do this, Seth.”_

_“Do what?”_

_“I can’t be a parent. You—you were right. I can’t do it—I’ll sign her over. Anything you want. Just—just come to the hospital and pick her up. Get her away from me.”_

_He was silent, frozen, because this was too much to take in, and sobbing took up the blank space, abruptly cut off with a shaky—resigned?—sigh._

_“She still cries for you at night. It’s been months, Seth. Come get her.”_

_He stood, phone dangling from limp fingers, frozen; then everything she had said hit him at once and he crashed to his knees and started to sob. Kevin sprinted up to him, barking in alarm, and Seth gathered the dog into his arms and squeezed him, laughs choking out between the sobs, stumbling to get his shoes and jacket and get out the door._

_Aveline was coming home._

“No,” he murmurs, a clearing of the throat, then, “No, it’s not.”

The paramedic knows better than to push, and he settles back into his side of the ambulance.  

If they hadn’t gone.

 

* * *

 

 

When he was younger, maybe as young as five, maybe as old as seven or eight, he’d gotten in a fight at the park and punched the other kid in the jaw. He’d hit him hard enough to make him stumble backward and crack his head on the jungle gym, one of those metal puzzles with monkey bars and risers crosshatched haphazardly as though the builder had misplaced pages of the instructions and didn’t quite care enough to correct the mistakes, the seemingly institutional standard of public park playgrounds. Standing over the kid, watching him tenderly feeling his scalp and running his tongue along his teeth, his fist still curled and fingers aching from the blow, a swell of dread— _what did I just do_ , fiery hot, molten hot—consumed him, coiled in his belly like the swig of warm beer with the cigarette filter in it he’d stolen from a bottle his mom hadn’t quite finished before going to work one night, and thick, syrupy guilt crept over him, sticking his feet to the cement as solidly as a pair of weights. And then the kid brought his hand away, sticky wet with blood, and before he could even scream Dean was gone, halfway home at a full sprint. That time, it had been a relief when the familiar yellow eviction notice showed up on the door and they’d left the neighborhood. He never saw the kid again.

He hadn’t thought about that fight, that moment, in years, but that feeling, that dawning sense of the crushing weight of consequences for a moment’s lapse of judgement, had washed over Dean again the instant Aveline had started to cough.

Now, pacing the length of the emergency room at the hospital (how the fuck had he beaten the ambulance here? Then again, he didn’t remember the ride except as a reckless blur of headlights and an astonishing number of broken traffic laws), fists clenched and shoulders knotted up around his ears, it was all he could think about. Years and years removed, he couldn’t remember what the kid had said to provoke him, but then again, it really didn’t matter, he hadn’t exactly been difficult to provoke at that time. That fight was far from the only one. What horrified him about it in retrospect, what set his skin to crawling, was the expression of that other kid, stumbling to his feet with blood matted in his hair, watching him bolt. An image of Aveline with sticky damp curls and a dazed expression, pulling her painted fingernails away from her scalp drenched in red, a line dripping down her forehead—he shook his head, violently, shoving a knuckle into his mouth and biting down hard until the picture dissolved. No blood. Just coughing, and not being able to breathe, and turning blue—screaming red and white lights caught his attention, and he realized he’d dropped to a seat and was clenching his free hand so tightly around his thigh that he’d lost feeling from his knee down.

“Thank fuck,” he muttered, as the doors opened and the stretcher was wheeled in, her body so small against that ocean of whiteness and metal, but eyes bright and wide and mouth curved in a smile at something the paramedic had said, a smile that dwarfed the weariness in her face, frizzy curls fanning around her head like a haphazard halo, looking every inch an angel. And Seth, beside her, clutching her hand, face immobile and blank as if it had been carved from marble, his shoulders well back and chin high, bearing up under the literal weight of the world (it didn’t matter that weight was only forty pounds—forty pounds was a lot when it was measured only on your heart). He nudged a chair on his way past, sounding a clang of imitation metal on imitation metal down a row until it met the wall, and gazes swiveled; maybe it was his imagination, but dark eyes softened just a hint, and blue eyes widened in time with the impossibly big smile.

“Dean!” she cried, and he didn’t know it was possible to feel so much at once, but he was by her side and her free hand groped for his. Instinctively he held his hand out but then jerked back—he hadn’t washed his hands, what if there were crumbs on his hands?—and of course, she couldn’t read his mind, so all she saw was his hand pulled away from her, and her smile crumbled. “Daddy?”

Her voice was so small, so broken, and she was still looking at him, and it hit him like a freight train that she was talking to **him** , not to Seth. Over her head, dark eyes stared at him, impassive and incredulous at the same time, urging him just to take her hand, but he shook his head, mouth sand-paper dry, and scraped, and nothing came out. He couldn’t touch her.

Tears welled in her eyes, and she began to sob, heaving, harsh gasps that cut through him, “D-daddy, wh-why won’t you h-hold my hand?”

“Aveline—” He meant to tell her, her meant to explain, but her wails rose in pitch at the no, and she was shaking her head and thrashing back and forth, and the blister of Seth’s eyes on him was too much. He didn’t deserve this, didn’t deserve her, didn’t deserve to be called—a parent. He couldn’t even say the damn word in his head, his brain short-circuited around the word, cruelly intensifying the focus on that little hand still held out. He couldn’t reach for it, and he couldn’t pull back, he was trapped, frozen to the floor, pinned by the weight of his own inadequacy. He couldn’t, didn’t she see?

“I d-didn’t mean to,” she whimpered, voice getting tighter with each word, “I’m s-sorry, Daddy,” and suddenly she was coughing again, choking, “D-dean,” and there were nurses between him and the bed, pushing him back with crisp, efficient voices, the same voices raised in intensity and lowered in volume as the stretcher was wheeled away, fits of wheezing coughs broken by hysterical sobs, and he and Seth stood there, staring at each other with a big empty space in the middle. For a moment, the other man wavered, eyes darting at him, before he bolted after the bed, the cries, but he was too late; the doctors pushed her through the swinging double doors and there was suddenly eerie, paper-thin silence.

“What the fuck was that?” Nothing about his position had changed—his posture, rigid, one hand still outstretched as though the rail were still there, her fingers millimeters away, his face, empty, blank. Dean shook his head, unable to make the words come out, unable to make his mouth move, and Seth was there, in his face, shattered fury and broken sharp edges, repeating himself, voice dangerously soft, “What the _fuck_ was that?”

“I—I just—I didn’t—my hands,” he pandered weakly, gesturing at his palms, begging with his eyes, _please, understand me, understand_. The dark-haired man shook his head, strands of hair escaping the binding and falling around his face, framing it, and oh, like father like daughter. Dean wanted to laugh, the wild capricious sound rose in his throat and choked itself off, and he shook his head, unable to meet Seth’s eyes. They were laid bare, raw, in the moment, and that was what hurt the most in his words.

“My daughter called you daddy—and you couldn’t even hold her hand?”    

It was the ice in his tone that brought Dean’s defenses up, shook him out of his stupor, because, oh, oh, this was familiar, he knew how this worked. But he didn’t want to fight with Seth; he wanted to pull him close and talk, and make him _understand_. He wanted to smooth the flyaways back from his face and still that quivering lip. And, yet, something sick and twisted and dark in his head was muttering, _you knew it all along, it had to happen sometime, you fucked up, you’ve fucked up real good this time_.

“I didn’t want to,” he replied, a little more curtly than he intended, and the hurt that registers in brown eyes for a split second is almost enough to send Dean to his knees. I didn’t mean it like that, he wants to scream, I didn’t mean that.

“You didn’t want to? She was crying for you, and you didn’t _want_ to?”

“It’s not my fault,” Dean snaps, the war raging between his heart and his gut too much now, and he backs away, shaking his head, because this isn’t right. This isn’t how it’s supposed to work between him and Seth. “It’s not my fault—fuck, I didn’t know they were fried! I’m sorry! I didn’t know!”

He’s screaming, he only realizes he’s screaming because the echoes of his own voice shock back to him, the entire waiting area stilled into silence by the force of his rage, and there are soft hands on his wrists, tugging, and he jerks away, because no no no no, that’s not right, he doesn’t deserve tenderness. It is his fault. He filled the plate. It is his fault. He fed her. It is his fault. “It’s not my fault,” he manages again, hating the crack in his voice, hating the weakness, hating himself so entirely for hurting that little girl that he loves so much it breaks his heart.

“Dean, I know,” Seth murmurs, and his voice is as broken and hopeless as Aveline’s had been, when his cowardice wouldn’t let him take her hand. “I know it’s not. It’s not your fault.”

Really, that’s what breaks him, Seth’s voice, saying those words that aren’t true. Dean shakes his head, mouth sealed shut, hands clenched so tightly into fists he can feel his blunt nails digging into his palms, struggling for control; so when a hand reaches out and grazes his bicep, it’s like an electric shock, and he jolts, leaping back as though the touch burns. And it does, really, the kindness of the motion scorches him, and he shakes his head again, fists still clenched, forcing back the tears he doesn’t deserve to let fall. “I didn’t mean to hurt you,” he grinds out, shoulders taut and quivering like an overstrung bow, “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Then he turns on a heel and takes off for the door, leaving Seth in his wake, unsure exactly who he was apologizing to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm SO sorry, guys. Work was a killer and this chapter was fighting me and just ugh in general. 
> 
> That said... sorry it's 3 parts now please don't kill me. There was just too much to squeeze in, and it kept growing as I wrote, which was part of the problem... 
> 
> I should probably add a language tag to this, huh?


	14. Dirty hands: iii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FINALLY. 
> 
> Dedications to KailynnYukari, DeansDirtyDeeds, Britt_B, leadusnot, daltonacademyfightclub, WhenItReignsItRoars, Neffectual, and blytheedward for commenting. 
> 
> And holy carp, guys, over 2700 hits. Like. Whoa. 
> 
> I'd also like to make a(nother) shout-out to leadusnot for bearing with me and beta-reading parts of this beast until I'm sure she wanted to gut me like a fish. She's the best. 
> 
> Very light gore warning? There's some blood in this chapter.

His knuckles had started bleeding five minutes ago, leaving increasingly darkened red smears on the blotchy uneven grey of the decorative pillar, but the repetitive motion was calming, keeping the tension in his belly pressed against his rib cage instead of coiled around his lungs. He focused on his breathing, in, out, steady, slow, and the rhythm of his fists striking the concrete, the little thuds and the corresponding shocks in his abused joints. There was a steady throb in his hands, now, and the fists were more and more loose because it was getting harder and harder to hold his fingers together, but he kept throwing jabs, because it was something to do besides sit in the waiting room, too ashamed to face Seth, incapable of considering facing Aveline, letting the guilt fester and bubble and feeling like an absolute sack of useless failure.

_You should have known._ The thought that had curled around him at first like a wisp of smoke was now flames at his back, licking his heels, because _you should have known, you fucking moron, this is your fault_. He lost his rhythm then, left hand crunching into the pillar with a wet squelch and a real stab of agony that traveled up his arm like blistering white heat and, for a moment, cleared away the haze. He rested his right palm against the smears, sinking into a crouch and curling in on himself like a dry leaf. His hair was sticky with sweat, clinging to the sides of his face and hanging over his forehead in a matted clump; he did his best to pretend that the wetness dripping down from his chin was sweat, too.

“I’m sorry, Avi,” he murmured, voice barely audible even to himself, more a plea than an apology, “I’m so, so sorry, baby girl…” _I’m sorry I failed you. I’m sorry I’m not enough. I’m sorry you deserve so much more._ He sank with each thought, till he was on his knees, slumping against the pillar he had marked, fist to his mouth and teeth sinking into his thumb to keep the sound in his mouth from spilling out. _I’m sorry._

He hadn’t heard the mechanical swish, the sound of the automatic doors opening, so the voice behind him startled him to his feet.

“Dean?”

He stayed as he was, facing away, facing the brick façade of the building, swaying a little. He heard the footsteps shuffle, once, then he heard deliberate movement, and a cold hand settled hesitantly on his shoulder. Then the thumb rubbed, over and back, comforting, soothing, and at the unexpected _undeserved_ tenderness, he sucked in a breath that made his lungs seize. He didn’t have words, not when it was important. Words tended to fail him then. So he reached up and tangled his bloody fingers with Seth’s, unable to talk around the lump in his throat, not sure he’d have anything to say even if he could.

At his best, Dean was not a nurturing person. He hadn’t been equipped with the proper capacity for sharing intimacy and gentleness, either by deficiency of nature or nurture, and his entire life had been a long, bloody battle fought by a reckless man with a penchant for doing the Exact Wrong Thing, which tended to leave a lot of broken hearts and disappointed hopes in his wake. Less than a year ago, he had been alone, content, and completely convinced that he would never in a thousand years have anyone in his life that could hurt him or that he could hurt.

And now—bloody knuckles in front of an emergency room, with a man he loved holding his dirty hands, waiting for news about a little girl who couldn’t breathe on her own.

“The doctors have her stabilized for now, and she’s asleep,” Seth reported, gently, the kind of gentleness that was offered, the kind of gentleness honed by loving wholly, not the kind of thing that Dean was used to. He was used to the skin-deep calm that was presented to cornered wild things who might lash out at any second, the façade of caring that slipped a noose around his neck and backed him into a cage. He turned his head, watching his blood drip onto Seth’s callused hands, eyes downcast because he still couldn’t bring himself to meet his eyes. “She asked for you, again.”

He stiffened, tried to pull away, but the other man was right behind him, forehead pressed against the back of his neck, other arm wrapped around his shoulder, holding him, supporting him, because that was what Seth _did_. Dean rejected his daughter in a moment of dire need, and instead of being at her side, he was _here_ , with _him_ , comforting _him_. A choked laugh escaped him, a bubble of mirthless incredulity, and he shook his head.

“How do you do it,” he croaked. His voice was brittle, hard and sharp in a way that reminded Seth of the mercury glass candle holders he'd been allowed to hold once when his family was decorating for the holidays. One had simply fallen to pieces in his hand, so suddenly he hadn’t even cried out, glass tinkling as it shattered. Seth kept his face pressed into the warmth of flesh, planting a tentative kiss on a shoulder so stiff it was trembling, knowing that he held something far more precious and far more breakable than that glass now.

"You plan for ways to keep it from happening. And you plan the things to do in case it does," he murmured, softly, knowing very well that wasn't what Dean was asking but unwilling to go there right now. The body he was leaning against moved suddenly, a hand catching his chin and lifting it, forcing him to meet darkened blue eyes roiling with raw emotions. There were smears of red on his face, trails of red down his cheeks where blood had gotten mixed in with the sweat and the tears that puffy eyes betrayed. He tried to turn his head, to stop looking at something that felt so much like he shouldn't see it, but callused fingers held him still.

"How do you do it," he repeated, voice steady but still eerily brittle, the tumult still flashing in his eyes, and Seth realized the hand cupping his jaw was quivering. "How do you care so much, and give so much, and love so fucking much, and not break down?"

His lip quavered, so many words trapped in his mouth threatening his hard won self-control, because _oh, Dean, oh, Dean, if you only knew_ , and god, if he could only look away--

"You don't," finally tumbled out of his mouth, “you get hurt. And you get knocked down and stepped on, and you get back up and reach out again, because people need you,” and a bloody hand was fisted in his shirt and the taller man folded into him, sobbing soft, broken sobs that were worse because they spoke of years of learning to stifle his pain. Seth wrapped his arms around Dean, pressing his face into sweat-damp lank blond, his own face somehow dry, and crooning instinctive phrases against it, "You didn’t do anything wrong, this is not your fault, Dean, god, Dean, it’s okay…”

With every word, the knot of tension in Dean’s chest eased, the aching sobs from his gut stuttering out less and less frequently—“I’m here, Dean. I’m here…”—until he was just pressed into Seth’s chest, clinging to him, forehead on his shoulder, letting the honey smoothness of the other man’s voice drown out the vicious voice still echoing in his own head. “Dean, it’s okay. I’m not going anywhere. I love you--"

The words fell out so easily, so naturally, that at first he didn’t even realize what Seth had said. And then it hit him, a static tingle along his spine, because suddenly the voice faltered, and the words hung there, electric in the gray fluorescence of the outdoor lights. He lifted his head, blinking slowly as he took in Seth’s face, the expression a cocktail of astonishment, defiance, and more than a dash of fear. There was a half-thumbprint smudge of red cresting over his stubble, near the corner of his mouth, where Dean had held his jaw five moments ago; there were dark circles pooling under his eyes, eyes that were puffy and red and looking anywhere but at him; there was a tautness to the lines of his face that suggested stubbornness was the only thing keeping his feet planted.

Never had he thought another human being looked so beautiful.

 “I—I’m sorry. Now isn’t the time for that—I—” Seth stuttered to a halt as Dean leaned their foreheads together, and against his own better judgement he looked up, into those impossibly blue blue blue eyes, and at that quirked crooked smile, and he knew he didn’t mean a single word he had just said. He loved Dean. He loved him so goddamn much it terrified him. He had spent so long looking for him after Aveline had fallen asleep, he was afraid he had gone; but then he saw that lean shadow, boxing a pillar as though he were fighting demons, and his heart was in his throat, though whether from relief or heartache he couldn’t tell.

Dean rested a hand against his face, jolting Seth’s attention back to the present, and pressed their lips together. Even after five—six?—months together, he couldn’t quite find the words to describe precisely what kissing Seth was like. Perfect, obviously, but that wasn’t nearly broad enough. Sometimes it was like that moment you take the first sip of a hot cup of coffee—hot, scalding hot, but it clears your head and brings the moment into sharper focus; sometimes it was more like a shot of good whiskey, smooth and clear and tingling all the way down to your core. Mostly it was just natural and easy, like sliding into a pair of jeans you’d worn to the perfect cling, and yet it was never enough. He could—and had—kissed bruises into Seth’s mouth and still wanted more. Some mornings Dean rolled over and bumped into him, curled tight against his back, and just spent minutes tracing the outlines of his face, carving it into his memory, because he still wasn’t entirely convinced this was a real thing that was happening to him. He pulled back and almost reverently kissed Seth’s upper lip, then his lower, and touched one final, infinitely soft kiss to the corner of his mouth. As he pulled away, Seth followed, a tilt of the head to keep their lips close, eyes half-lidded, and Dean was only so strong a man; he kissed him again, hungrily, until their mingled breath was ragged.

“I love you too,” he murmured, almost panting, still cupping Seth’s face with one battered hand, brushing the pad of his thumb under his eye. “Fuck, I love you, Seth. I’m—shit, I’m so bad at this—I’m sorry,” he started, but there was so much that he had to repent for, so very much, that the words stuck in his throat, and it was a relief when soft lips turned up and pressed into his own again and swallowed the apology. He drew the smaller man closer, holding him, clutching him, vowing silently that he would do this right. He would be better. For both of them.

“Let’s get you cleaned up and then see about the princess, okay?” Seth’s voice was soft as he withdrew, that gentle persuasion that cleared his head again, and he nodded, brushing his hand over the bloody prints on the pillar and smearing them more as he turned. He was dreading seeing Aveline; how could he possibly offer anything to her that would make up for that moment? And every part of his arms ached, now that he was paying a little more attention, and there was what felt like an inch of blood crusted between his fingers, making him feel weak and filthy. But when Seth laced their fingers together and pulled one arm around his shoulders, bringing his dark head to rest on a sore shoulder as they walked indoors, Dean had never felt more.

On the pillar behind them, fading to a dull brownish-red that one of the interns would almost blister his hands with bleach to get clean, the smear—if you squinted, and got the perfect angle—almost looked like a heart.

 

* * *

 

The hallways were quiet as Seth led Dean to the room that had been assigned to Aveline, after a quick detour to get some gauze for his hands. Because her reaction had been so violent, the doctors wanted to keep her overnight for observation, he explained, so they got a room. She was still asleep when they got there (and guilt washed over him in tandem with the relief he felt), curled on her side, looking so painfully small for that big hospital bed, and an hour ago he wouldn’t have thought twice of curling up beside her in the sea of white space. Now—it was all he could manage to reach out and brush a few strands of curl off her cheek, fingers lingering a heartbeat too long at the nape of her neck, adjusting the crinkled sheet that sort of passed for a blanket if you didn’t really know the function of a blanket more tightly around her.

Seth guided him to take one of a pair of chairs opposite the bed, against the window. The moonlight silhouetted them through the sheer curtain, casting foamy shadows that didn’t quite reach the form on the bed. They sat in silence for a while, Seth’s fingers brushing a pattern into his skin in time with the steady beeping of the machines hooked up to their daughter, until suddenly the tranquility of the scene clawed at the back of Dean’s throat and he had to do something, say something, to keep from smashing his fists into a wall again.

“How did you find out?” he asked, abruptly, startling Seth out of a half-doze. The other man stretched, rolling a kink out of his neck, and blinked blearily at him.

“Find out? About what? The allergy?”

“Yeah. You told me about it when we first started dating, and you always have all her stuff with you, but—how did you find out about it?”

 Aveline stirred in her sleep, making a small noise, and both pairs of eyes flew to her. She didn’t wake, however, simply rolling over and curling up again, this time facing away from them. Her hair had come loose, either during the ambulance ride or the treatment, and it was a fluffy mess, curling haphazardly and wildly down her back, almost longer than she was in her current position. Seth got to his feet, approaching the bed and resting a hand against her cheek; he turned back to Dean, face tilted down, and began, “Victoria—her mom—fed her peanut butter. The first time.”

His voice was soft and carefully neutral, and his speech was unnaturally slow. That, more than anything, was what made Dean’s chest hurt—watching Seth fight with himself, watching him weigh each word as though it cost him to speak. He wanted to cut him off, to tell him it was okay, he didn’t need to know, but he was continuing, and it was as though he was lost in a memory.

“She was so small. She was only fifteen pounds, at a year old… she was still wearing three to six month clothes. And her hands—her whole hand could barely wrap around my thumb.” He inhaled, sharply, a pained furrow creasing his brow. “Doctors say to be careful with nuts and other foods that are common allergens. But by a year old, it’s safer to try them. Victoria—I got a call, one night. This was after she had left. She was in tears and panicking, she said that Aveline was in the ER and I needed to come get her. I hadn’t—I hadn’t seen her in months. I made it to the hospital in six minutes.” He chuckled, but it was more like a balloon being punctured. He turned back towards the little girl on the bed, hands gripping the rail at the side. “She had a second reaction once she had been admitted. I got here as they were giving her a second dose of epinephrine. Even though she was so tiny, it still took four people to get that shot in her… She was screaming, crying, thrashing around—and then she looked up and saw me in the doorway.”  

He took another breath, this one shaky, and Dean realized his whole body was shaking. He straightened and looked at Seth, taking in the rigidity of his shoulders, the spasms that occasionally danced across his back, the grit of his teeth as he swallowed and continued speaking. “She was so scared, Dean. I saw it in her face. She couldn’t breathe, she was hurting, she didn’t know what was happening. And no one was there for her, no one was holding her hand… But when she saw me, she just stopped. Like a mute button. No more crying, no more flailing. She just—she just reached out towards me.”

“They gave her the shot, and then gave her to me, this tiny little thing with a dirty shirt and snot dripping down her face, and—and—” Seth had sunk to the floor, crouching almost the way Dean had outside, next to the pillar, his arms stretched up where he still clutched the rail. He sucked in a breath that sounded more like a gasp, and his voice cracked. “She wrapped her arms around my neck and said, ‘Daddy.’”

Dean walked over to the other man, drawing him into his arms; Seth tilted his head up to look at him, eyes clouded with pain, tears dripping down his cheeks seemingly unbeknownst to him. It may as well have been a knife in Dean’s chest. He was an idiot; he had been so wrapped up in his own misgivings and panic and moment of failure that he hadn’t been paying attention to Seth. Of course he was struggling too. That was his little girl in that bed, more than she was Dean’s, his flesh and blood that he had rocked to sleep and changed diapers for and nursed when she was sick and kissed every wound better except one. “I’m supposed to protect her,” he sobbed, banging one of his fists against the metal leg of the bed. “I’m supposed to keep her safe. And I couldn’t even remember about the goddamn oil… I was so scared, I was so fucking scared I was gonna lose her this time… Because I didn’t remember about the fucking peanut oil…”

“Seth, it’s not your fault,” Dean interrupted, drawing his face up so watery brown was forced to meet blue. “It’s not your fault. She’s here. She’s gonna be fine. Seth, you don’t have to be the hero all the time; I’m here. I’m here. I love you. I love you both so much.”

The dark-haired man hiccupped and began sobbing afresh, letting himself be rocked, pressing as tightly into the other man as he could without crawling into his ribcage. Dean cradled him, face against his hair, murmuring soothing words he didn’t know he had in him, until the sobs receded to occasional hiccups and finally to deep, even breathing that indicated Seth had cried himself to sleep. Dean scrubbed at his face with one hand, scratching at the beginnings of tomorrow’s stubble, before carefully maneuvering himself upright and bringing the other man up bridal style. He considered briefly placing him in one of the chairs, but Aveline chose that moment to roll over again, and it was almost without thinking that he draped Seth’s longer body around hers on the bed, arranging his arms around her.

He dragged one of the chairs closer to the bed, kicking his feet up on the rail, and sighed heavily, again scrubbing at his face and digging his knuckles into his eyes until he saw stars. Now that he was alone again, the self-loathing was creaking out of its tomb, crawling along his arms and dragging across hastily bandaged fingers. He was such an idiot. He didn’t deserve that man. He didn’t deserve that little girl—

“Dean?”

He flew upright, blinking a few times for his eyes to adapt to the less-than-semidarkness of the room, and meet blue eyes cautiously studying him. Her voice was hoarse, probably from the coughing fits, and all he could really make out from his current vantage point were her eyes and the top of her head; the rest was shielded by Seth’s forearm. He replied, after far too long, the words sticking to the roof of his mouth like overcooked pasta and falling to the floor like weighted balloons, “Yeah. It’s me, Aveline.”

Her eyes shone suddenly, and she wriggled out from beneath Seth’s arm to crawl closer to the edge of the bed, wrapping her arms around his shoes. “You came back.”

Another knife joined the one left from Seth’s breakdown. “Of course I did, princess. I shouldn’t—I shouldn’t have left in the first place.”

“You were scared,” she said, matter-of-factly, and both knives twisted and inched up his gut. “Daddy told me you thought you had crumbs on your hands. And that would have made me real worse. So it’s okay. I’m happy you came back though! Cause, last time—somebody didn’t.”

Dean leaned forward and caught one of her hands with his, squeezing as tightly as he dared, and as he spoke his voice was as hoarse as hers. “Aveline—I’m so sorry. I’m never gonna go away again. I’m staying right here. With you.”

And there was that smile, the one he had last seen a few hours ago, before he broke her heart, before he came to terms with his own shortcomings—that smile that could light a neighborhood, was all he needed.

When the tattooed paramedic came in, half an hour later at the end of his shift, to check on the little girl who had the allergic reaction he’d brought in, he found her snugly nestled between a dark-haired man and a blond one, wrapped in both of their arms and holding tightly to each of them with one little fist, and he left with a smile on his face. He wasn’t sure that allowing three people in one bed was strictly protocol, but he wasn’t about to tell the nurses.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M SO SORRY GUYS THIS CHAPTER WAS A MONSTER AND IT EVOLVED SO MANY TIMES IT WAS JUST AWFUL I'M SORRY I'M SORRY
> 
> But here it is. FINALLY.
> 
> NO MORE CLIFFHANGERS. EVER. 
> 
> Next up is Dean's birthday! Even though I'm like, two weeks late. IT'S FINE.


	15. technical serendipities: or, technical difficulties

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know literally nothing about technology so please take everything I say about anything technical with so many grains of salt. Like. Seriously all of them. 
> 
> Also: spot the cameos!

Dean wasn’t sure why his laptop had suddenly synced with every other computer in the household, but he was sure that he wanted it to “fucking stop doing that this fucking second, you piece of shit!”

When the machine failed to respond to his expletive-laden command, he slumped back against the couch, scrubbing at his eyes and kicking his feet in what was most definitely not a minor tantrum. Seth emerged from the bedroom where he had just tucked in a sleeping Aveline, taking in the scene with a critical eye; ultimately, he decided the best course of action was to approach with caution, as one might approach a jungle cat that had escaped its cage at the zoo.

He crept down the short hallway, sliding his stockinged feet carefully so as not to make any noise, slipping up behind his beleaguered significant other and pouncing—that is, giving him a gentle shoulder massage until the mumbled grumbles of vaguely plausible things Dean wanted to do to the computer in his lap faded into contented grumbles of vaguely plausible things Dean wanted to do to _him_.

Sleepy blue eyes cracked as he tilted his head back against Seth’s pelvis, nuzzling into the warmth of his arms as they tightened around his shoulders. “Have I told you lately that you’re the best?”

“Only once every fifteen minutes,” Seth murmured affectionately, leaning to press an upside down kiss to his boyfriend’s mouth. Dean’s arms linked around his neck as he pulled back, forcing him to kneel and press their foreheads together. “You should go to bed,” he continued, his hands wriggling free to knead again at the knots in Dean’s neck.

“Yep,” Dean responded, curling his fingers against the nape of Seth’s neck and playing with the wisps of hair that had escaped his bun, “I probably should.”

Seth huffed and extricated himself, standing over his boyfriend and fixing him with his patented Look. Dean, still comfortably sprawled against the back of the couch, just smiled lazily and scratched a pattern on the inside of his wrist. After a few more minutes of the deadlock, with no sign of flagging on Seth’s part, he sighed heavily and raised his hands in defeat. “Okay, okay, okay. I will go to bed… in fifteen minutes, after I finish reading this project objective bullshit.”

Seth’s face melted into a half-smile, and he nodded, leaning down to press another kiss to his forehead. “I’m timing you,” he called, as he walked away, and Dean rolled his eyes—but checked the time all the same.

The distraction of Seth had gotten him through most of the hissy fit his laptop had thrown, but it was still running excessively slowly; he groaned as he closed his email and realized first that he had gotten two more emails about the project and second that whatever the weird technical malfunction had been, it had opened approximately every single file that had ever existed on his laptop. He opened the emails and groaned again, because each of them was a wall of text with no less than three attachments.

In November, Dean had gotten an offer from an established architectural firm that was looking for a full-time designer—full-time, as in a set schedule, consistent paychecks, and benefits. He’d gotten a few similar offers before but had almost instantly rejected them because, as he insisted to Roman, he “preferred the freedom of free-lance work” and “didn’t want to have a boss breathing down his fucking neck all day.” Of course, those had all been a few years ago, before a smirking bartender and his doe-eyed princess had fallen into his life, and as he held the crisp corporate stock and looked at the two of them curled up together, reading on the couch, his priorities re-arranged themselves.

So it was that Dean had gotten his first big kid job, complete with timecard, water cooler, and (gulp) health insurance. The firm he was now employed by was a very different kind of firm, his boss (an emphatically gesturing man who wore a scarf he absolutely insisted was worth $750 instead of wearing a tie and wanted his employees to call him “Chris”) assured him; they catered to an elite clientele and as such were a full-service one-stop shop. To Dean, though, it felt pretty much like what he imagined any other office job would feel, except that he was getting to do what he loved and actually getting paid in a timely fashion. And then one of the other designers—a very nice but very overworked and underappreciated man named Cody—quit, and Dean, along with the rest of his workload, inherited the Breeze account. Since then, his every waking moment on- or off-the-clock had been dedicated to appeasing the capricious whims of a narcissistic man-child and his flavor of the week (he’d gone through a former-athlete-turned model with a nose that could rival Cyrano de Bergerac and a much older African-American gentleman who looked just as bewildered as the company did that he was there, and his latest was a smoking hot Latino that Dean was utterly convinced was an exotic dancer).

It was now early December, and Dean was contemplating the realistic outcomes of not reading these three particular emails. His past experience with Mr. Tyler Breeze led him to believe that it was quite likely he could just disregard them, as the gentleman would be sure to call him and explain everything in excruciating detail the next morning, but he almost felt a little bad for not even bothering to read them. Then the next email, longer than the rest, arrived, and he resolutely closed the pages and was about to close the laptop altogether when he glanced at his taskbar and realized he still had about 300 windows open.  

He sighed heavily and set about the task of closing some of them, so at least the piece of shit would boot up slightly faster than the speed of smell in the morning. After about ten clicks, he began to notice that the file names didn’t look at all familiar. Interest piqued, he clicked into one of them and browsed a few pages of “healthy snacks for children with nut allergies.”

He blamed his tiredness for failing to catch on sooner that they must have been Seth’s—things he had saved to the Cloud or to the wireless external hard drive Dean had brought from his apartment.

He backed out of the document immediately, feeling like he was an intruder, but then—he glanced over his shoulder. Christmas was coming up, after all, and he had not a clue in the world what to get for the other man (well, that was strictly true; he had a clue, but that was a very different thing, and he wanted him to be able to unwrap something). And here fate was, dropping the perfect chance to snoop literally into his lap! So he set about it, weighing the chance that each document could have potential clues before opening it—after all, he had no idea if Seth would be able to tell what he had done.  

Until he got to one particular folder that was considerably larger than the rest. It didn’t have a proper name; it was just labeled “A.” He puzzled over that for a moment before glancing over his shoulder again, and then his curiosity took temporary control of his hand and clicked to open the window.

It was just more folders.

He harrumphed his disappointment and was about to back out and close the window, when on his way up to the red X in the corner he hovered a moment too long over one of the nondescript manila icons labeled “3 mos.” His screen exploded with miniature pictures of a dark-haired baby, probably a hundred of them, and it hit him like a punch in the gut that these must be pictures of Aveline. The cursor still hovered, and without pausing to think he dragged until all of the folders were highlighted and clicked to open them.

It wasn’t that he hadn’t ever seen pictures of Avi as a baby—Seth had a few, and he routinely trotted them out for Aveline to view when she wanted to. But he was weirdly reticent to share them with Dean, though he ultimately had, and for someone who was as loving and affectionate to his daughter as Seth was, Dean found that he shied away from taking pictures of her on his own. And he occasionally got downright irritated with Dean’s constant shutterbug clicking; they hadn’t officially fought about it, but it had come to raised voice before. So for him to find a cache of literally hundreds of pictures of her confused him to his core and raised uncomfortable swirling tendrils of questions in his belly.

He clicked through a few, noting that her eyes had been that particular heart-stopping shade of blue since days after her birth, and the discomfort in his gut began to prod at him, because there was something wrong with these images. It wasn’t until he came across a picture of Seth holding the baby that he realized what it was.

In practically none of the pictures was Aveline smiling. She was attentive and alert—well, she was usually looking at the camera, at least—but most of the time, her mouth was set in a soft line.  Outdoors, indoors, playing, sleeping, none of them held smiles.

But in that picture with Seth—his little girl was lit up like a candle.

Dean pressed a hand to his mouth, biting softly at his thumb, as he paused on the image. A younger Seth, his eyes crinkled in the smile that made Dean’s heart skip a few beats, held baby Avi on his shoulders, supporting her butt and back with his hands, while her small fingers coiled into his messy hair. Her eyes were closed and her mouth was wide open in the kind of joyful shape that indicated belly laughter, beaming with the joy and joie de vivre that Dean found familiar. It was messily composed and blurry at the edges, but it was his Seth and his Avi through and through. When he finally scrolled to the next image, she was practically unrecognizable, back to the folded mouth and somber, serious face. It was no wonder it had taken him so long to realize they were her baby pictures—this baby didn’t look anything like the beaming, laughing, rebellious, irrepressible little princess he knew.  

And then—

There was a picture of an unfamiliar woman whose bouncing dark curls looked just like the baby she held, and Dean caught his breath, because the little girl and the woman wore matching frowns down to the creases in their brows and he realized, _this had to be her mother_.

The swell of discomfort had become an ache, and he clicked to the next picture before he did something he regretted, like break the laptop in half. Then the next picture started moving and he realized it wasn’t a picture at all, it was a video, and so help him God—

_The camera was moving fuzzily but steadily, and there was a soft, throaty voice singing indistinctly. As the camera moved and the world came into focus, two shapes resolved out of the blur: a small, kicking shape on the ground, mid-diaper change, became baby Avi, and the larger shape hovering over her became Seth, who was singing softly, accompanied by the baby’s contented coos, “You are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy—” The baby attempted to roll away, and Seth broke into soft chuckles as he righted her, leaning down to blow a raspberry on her exposed belly that elicited peals of giggles, “You make me happy when skies are grey—” The thread of song cut off again as he did something out of sight, probably adjusted the diaper, and the baby’s thin arms reached up for him. He planted a kiss on each upturned hand, and rested his face down so that she could press them to his cheeks, “when skies are grey, you’ll never know, dear, how much I love you…”_

_An unfamiliar voice, distinctly feminine and clearly trained in a way that Seth’s was not, sang out, “Please don’t take my sunshine away.”_

_The smile vanished from the baby’s face and Seth’s face jerked around so quickly he almost headbutted Aveline in the stomach, and the video ended with soft, strained laughter close to the microphone._

Dean didn’t realize there were tears running down his face until they dripped onto his hands. When he did realize, he scrubbed at his face with one hand, clicking the “next” arrow with finality. An error message popped up that read, “Go to beginning of album?” He bit his lip and clicked no, sitting on the now still video, and it was almost like a brand on his ribs when he hovered over it and the location read “7 mos.”

He clicked the laptop shut with finality, feeling like he had trespassed on a graveyard, when from somewhere behind him, a sleepy voice took up the refrain, “You are m’sunshine, m’only sunshine,” and he wheeled around to see a barely standing Avi framed in the kitchen doorway.

“What—what are you doing up, sweetheart,” he finally managed around the thickness in his throat, sliding the laptop onto the couch and getting to his feet.

“Wanted a drink of water buh my bottle was empty,” she murmured, yawning heavily and brandishing the offending Hello Kitty sippy bottle, which was now about half-full.

“Silly girl,” he murmured, sweeping her into his arms and kissing her on the forehead. She nuzzled into his shoulder with a contented sigh that poured salt into the aching pit in his belly, and he made an abrupt decision, taking her into Seth’s bedroom. Seth was half-asleep already himself, and aside from a raised eyebrow when the extra weight settled in, he made no comment on the bed intruder. Dean slipped under the covers with the two people he loved most in the world, curling tightly around both, and buried his face in springy curls that smelled like sunshine and tried not to think about what he had seen.

(He would think about it, and in the early light of morning, when he got up to pee and came back to see daughter sprawled against father’s chest, mouth open in a sleeping smile, he hesitated before climbing back in bed, wanting to freeze the moment in his head forever. That was when he realized what he was getting Seth for Christmas.)

(He would talk to Seth about the pictures and the video and—her—sometime. Eventually. Maybe.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... this is an update. Yeah. 
> 
> I'm sorry it took me so long. It's just one of those things where I have so many ideas and so many things I want to do that I try to get them all out at once and either burn myself out or tangle the ideas together into a mash of something unrecognizable. 
> 
> This was sort of a therapy piece for me (not content wise, but doing the work wise) in the wake of the Orlando shooting. The night is dark and full of terrors, and I want the light to come back. 
> 
> Thank all of you, every single one, for reading this and supporting me so far. Seriously. It means so much.   
> That said, also have ALL THE ANGST because I want to hurt you guys, I guess? Oops.

**Author's Note:**

> There may be more to this. I'm not sure if Daddy Dean is done with me yet. 
> 
> Also I am unashamedly in love with Aveline.
> 
> Bonus points if you recognize the title.


End file.
